Gamestop suffers steep drop in Q2 like-for-like sales

A dearth of new titles knocked sales and profits at digital game retailer GameStop sharply lower.

Net sales fell 7.4% to reach $1.63bn year-on-year during the company's fiscal second quarter, alongside a 10.6% drop in comparable like-for-like sales due to difficult comparators.

In the year-ago quarter sales were boosted by a strong calendar if new title launches such as Batman: Arkman Knight and Elder Scrolls Online.

The release of new information about upcoming new consoles also hit hardware sales, the company said in a statement.

During the reference period, the company also acquired 507 new AT&T Mobility stores through the acquisition of three national AT&T authorised retailers for approximately $441m.

Profits after tax declined from $33.1m to $27.9m or 27 cents per share, versus 31 cents a year ago.

For the next three months, GameStop said it expected comparable-store sales to come in at a range between -2.0% to 1.0%, with diluted EPS between 53 to 58 cents.

EPS was seen in a range from $3.90 to $4.05 for the full-year and same-store sales performance between -4.5% and -1.5%.

As of 1659 BST shares in GameStop were down by 10.48% to $29.11.