Nintendo Co, the world’s largest maker of video games, fell the most in more than two years yesterday as CLSA Asia-Pacific Markets cut the stock to “sell” after the company was not added to the Nikkei 225 Stock Average.
The shares fell 8.4 percent to ¥10,860 as of the close of trade in Tokyo, the biggest drop since July 2011.
Before yesterday, the Kyoto-based company had gained 31 percent this year amid expectation the transfer of its listing to Tokyo from Osaka may see the stock added to the Nikkei.
Nintendo last month cut the price of its Wii U videogame console in the US, ahead of new machines from Sony Corp and Microsoft Corp, amid stalling sales and delays to new software titles.
Company president Satoru Iwata took the helm of US operations to drive growth as combined sales for its hardware totaled 1.8 million units in the quarter ended June, down from 3.1 million units a year earlier, as customers migrate to mobile devices for playing online games.
“The early signs of key first-party software inducing a major turnaround in Wii U console fundamentals are not promising, and the outlook for third-party support is grim,” Jay Defibaugh, an analyst at CLSA in Tokyo, said in a report in which he cut the stock to “sell” from “buy.”
“The value of iconic Nintendo franchises may be declining as younger generations discover gaming through mobile devices,” he added.
Nintendo shifted its main listing after the merger of the cash-equities platforms of the Tokyo and Osaka stock exchanges, a move that would have made it eligible for inclusion for the Nikkei.
Nikkei Inc, which compiles the Nikkei 225, on Friday said it will add Nitto Denko Corp and Tokyu Fudosan Holdings Corp to the measure. The changes to the gauge are the first since the bourse merger.
A review of membership in the Nikkei 225 is typically held once a year in autumn and implemented in early October, according to the Nikkei Web site.
An extraordinary replacement can be announced in the event of bankruptcy, mergers or corporate restructuring, it said.
Among the rows of vibrators, rubber torsos and leather harnesses at a Chinese sex toys exhibition in Shanghai this weekend, the beginnings of an artificial intelligence (AI)-driven shift in the industry quietly pulsed. China manufactures about 70 percent of the world’s sex toys, most of it the “hardware” on display at the fair — whether that be technicolor tentacled dildos or hyper-realistic personalized silicone dolls. Yet smart toys have been rising in popularity for some time. Many major European and US brands already offer tech-enhanced products that can enable long-distance love, monitor well-being and even bring people one step closer to
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