SAN JOSE, Calif. (AP) -- Stuck in an industrywide waiting game and faced with a high tax bill, video game publisher Electronic Arts Inc. swung to a loss in its fiscal fourth quarter and issued an outlook well below Wall Street expectations on Wednesday.
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The world's largest video game publisher said it lost $16 million, or 5 cents per share, for the three months ended March 31. In the year-ago period, the company posted a profit of $8 million, or 2 cents per share.
Revenue climbed to $641 million, up 16 percent from $553 million in the prior year.
Excluding certain items, the Redwood City, Calif.-based company said it would have earned $43 million, or 14 cents per share, compared to $30 million, or a 9 cents per share, a year ago. EA said the one-time charges included a repatriation tax of $375 million in foreign earnings and $59 million in acquisition costs.
On that basis, the company exceeded the expectations of 9 cents per share on revenue of $581 million from analysts polled by Thomson Financial.
For the full year, EA said it earned $236 million on revenue of $2.95 billion, compared to earnings of $504 million on revenue of $3.13 billion in the prior year.
For the current quarter ending in June, EA said it expected a loss of between 28 cents and 22 cents per share on revenue between $300 million and $340 million, taking into account an estimated 9 cents-per-share impact from stock option expenses, another 3 cents in amortization and 2 cents in restructuring charges. Analysts were projecting a loss of 19 cents on revenue of $412 million.
And for the current fiscal year, EA projected earnings excluding stock-based compensation and other one-time charges to be between 35 cents and 65 cents per share on revenue of between $2.7 billion and $2.95 billion. That's well below the analysts' earnings estimate of $1.07 per share on revenue of $3.12 billion.
Sales of video games industrywide have slowed as customers have been withholding purchases and waiting to switch to next-generation models of game consoles. In 2005, stalled purchases caused video game sales to fall 5 percent to $7 billion in the United States, according to market research firm NPD Group.
Shares of EA fell 4 cents to close at $54.50 then tumbled another $2.65, or almost 5 percent, after issuing its report.
