Analysts: Nintendo To Dominate November Hardware Sales

Ahead of the December 13th release of NPD's November U.S. sales figures, analysts from Wedbush Morgan and simExchange have predicted $1 billion in software sales, and Nintendo to dominate hardware sales with roughly 1 and 1.3 million units sold of Wii and DS, respectively. Wedbush Morgan's Michael Pachter has made the following predictions per platform: DS - 1,350,000 Wii - 950,000 Xbox 360 - 750,000 PSP - 650,000 PS2 - 485,000 PS3 - 420,000 GBA - 170,000 Pachter says that price cuts as well as increased Wii supplies during the week of Thanksgiving will give the month major bumps across the board, leading to numbers that could turn out to be "double the number of consoles sold last December," which he says "suggests that the holiday will be a good one for the U.S. publishers." Fantasy market simExchange has released its user-compiled numbers as well, for the following platforms: DS - 1,300,000 Wii - 1,060,000 Xbox 360 - 728,000 PSP - 468,000 PS3 - 410,000 SimExchange analyst Jesse Divnich said of the results, especially the flagging PlayStation 3, that "despite increasing PS3 sales, we do not expect any significant shift in PS3 market share in Sony’s favor until mid 2008" -- to coincide either with further price cuts or Metal Gear Solid 4 and GTAIV. On the software front, Pachter says Super Mario Galaxy, Activision’s Call of Duty 4: Modern Warfare, Rock Band, Need for Speed ProStreet, WWE SmackDown vs. Raw 2008 and Assassin’s Creed should lead new release sales, with continued sales of Guitar Hero III, Madden NFL 08, Wii Play and The Legend of Zelda: Phantom Hourglass. SimExchange has focused on most of the same, but adds Mass Effect and, of course, Halo 3 to the mix. "Once the November NPD data is reported," Pachter concludes, "we think that video game investors’ concerns about the economy will subside, and expect the U.S. publisher stocks to continue to appreciate. It may take until after the holidays when concerns about the “stalled” cycle are fully alleviated, and we expect volatility for video game stocks through the remainder of the year, although we retain an upward bias."