Nintendo Expected To Cut Year's Profit Forecast 30 Percent

Following a steady decline in Wii hardware sales throughout this year, Nintendo is looking forward to the key holiday season and the release of Wii Fit Plus and New Super Mario Bros -- but in a tough environment, the damage may have already been done. The company is expected to cut its earnings forecast and see an 11 percent fall in annual profits to 249.3 billion yen ($2.7 billion)-- the first decline in six years, thanks to Wii declines and a strong yen, Bloomberg reports today. Nintendo's fiscal year ends in March 2010, but when it next reports quarterly earnings on October 29, it's expected to cut its profit forecast by about 30 percent due to that weak first half, Deutsche Bank AG analyst Satoru Kikuchi tells Bloomberg. The company's current forecast called for 300 billion yen net income this fiscal year, even as Wii sales began to fall for the first time since launch in the quarter ended June 30, 2009. And September NPD results saw the mega-hit console trumped in the U.S. by the newly-slimlined and price-cut PlayStation 3, another first, while Enterbrain results showed the same situation in Japan. Referring to Nintendo's forecasts, Tokyo-based Citigroup analyst Soichiro Fukuda said, "Bad news will be exhausted with a large downward revision," according to Bloomberg's report.