Zynga's sales boosted to $335M during holiday quarter, says analyst

Wedbush analyst Michael Pachter has estimated that Zynga's revenues last quarter (ending December) reached $335 million or higher, ahead of the social game developer's fourth quarter financial report next Tuesday. Pachter said that result would beat previous sales estimates of $301 million, and was driven mainly by significant user growth on Facebook, as well as revenue growth from the company's rapidly expanding mobile business. That revenue is also a significant jump from the $306 million it reported for the July to September period, as the company was preparing to launch its IPO. Its profits during that period had fallen by nearly 54 percent year-over-year to $12.5 million. The analyst said the total monthly active user count across all of Zynga's Facebook games grew by 17 percent from 183 million in the third quarter (number adjusted to account for Facebook's recent changes in its user-counting methodology) to 215 million at the end of December. He added that Zynga increased its daily active user numbers on mobile platforms tenfold from November 1, 2010 to September 30, 2011, and predicted that growth continued into the fourth quarter, pointing to the popularity of Words with Friends and Hanging with Friends in particular. Pachter also said the company is "well-positioned for long-term growth" and will continue to grow its revenues in 2012 thanks to late 2011 releases (e.g. CastleVille), Hidden Chronicles' strong launch in January, and continued growth in the mobile space. Other analysts have previously forecasted similar success for the company, such as Baird Equity's Colin Sebastian, who said that "2012 could shape up to be a harvest year for Zynga" due to efforts to strengthen its platform, infrastructure and game development in 2011. Zynga currently has 243 million monthly active users across all of its games on Facebook, according to AppData. Pachter expects the developer to maintain a 240 million average during its first quarter (ending March), which would be an 11 percent increase over the previous quarter.