Nintendo profits slump as Wii demand falls

Nintendo has cut its full-year profit forecasts as sales of its Wii home console fall, with net income expected to be JPY 230 billion (USD 2.53 billion) for the year ending March 2010 - down from the JPY 300 billion (USD 3.30 billion) of previous forecasts.

For the six months to September 2009, Nintendo reported a JPY 69.5 billion (USD 772 million) profit, down 52 per cent from JPY 144.8 billion (USD 1.59 billion) a year earlier.

First half sales fell to JPY 548 billion (USD 6.1 billion), a drop of 34.5 per cent. The company has blamed a Wii price cut and the strength of the yen on the lowered performance.

For the six months to September, sales of Wii home consoles were 5.75 million, compared to 10 million for the first six months of the previous year. It expects to sell 20 million Wii consoles by the end of March 2010.

"There were fewer [Wii] software titles that briskly drove hardware sales this six-month period versus the same period a year ago,” said Nintendo in a statement.

Worldwide unit sales of Nintendo DS consoles – including the DSi launched in April in Europe – were 11.7 million during the six months, bringing life-to-date sales to 113.48 million.

While the most recent Pokemon titles performed well, the company admitted that "there were few noteworthy titles released overseas" with game sales for the handhelds reaching 71.15 million units during the period.