Nintendo reports $25m loss

Tokyo - Japanese videogame giant Nintendo said on Thursday it suffered a net loss of $25m for the six months to September, hit by a strong yen and a fall in sales of game consoles and software.

Nintendo's group net loss came to ¥2bn, reversing a net profit of ¥69.5bn a year earlier.

Group operating profit tumbled 48% to ¥54.2bn, and sales fell 33.7% to ¥363.2bn.

Nintendo plunged into the red as global hardware sales of its DS handheld game console tumbled 43% to 6.69 million units. Worldwide sales of DS software fell 23% to 54.84 million units.

The disappointing figures came despite Nintendo scoring a huge success with new Pocket Monsters software for the DS in Japan in September.

Full-year forecasts

"In the United States and Europe, however, this software has not been released yet and there were few hit titles that could lead hardware sales strongly," the Kyoto-based company said in a statement.

Global sales of the Wii console with a motion-controller also shrank.

The yen's rise against other major currencies, including a 15-year high against the dollar, also hurt earnings and the book value of Nintendo's assets denominated in foreign currencies, it said.

Nintendo left unchanged its full-year forecasts, bracing for a 60.6% plunge in net profit to ¥90bn.

It projected operating profit at ¥210bn, down 41.1% from the previous year, and sales at 1.1 trillion yen, down 23.3%.

It said in September its new-generation handheld 3DS, which enables players to play 3D games without special glasses, would miss the Christmas shopping season and would be released next year.