$260M IN GTA 6 PREORDERS BEFORE A SINGLE COPY SHIPS

🚨 $260 million in Grand Theft Auto 6 preorders, and the game does not ship until Nov. 19.

CNBC reports that analytics firm Newzoo puts global preorders at an estimated $260M, a figure it says signals the potential for $4.5 billion in sales by launch week.

The preview itself broke things. Netflix, in a rare move, carried the first extended look on Thursday. Some viewers got error messages. Netflix told CNBC members briefly had trouble accessing the service and it recovered quickly. Twitch hit bandwidth issues too, per Wells Fargo, who called player reaction largely positive.

📈 Take-Two, Rockstar's parent, nudged 2.5% higher in premarket Friday. Morgan Stanley and JP Morgan both described themselves as bullish, pointing to institutional and retail money crowding into gaming publishers ahead of the launch.

Wells Fargo is the holdout. They say the trailer only slightly lifted unit sales expectations, and that Take-Two needs positive news on GTA Online for a sustained rerating. They also flag the risk of a miss or a delay.

The backdrop is a console market in trouble. Circana data cited by CNBC shows US console hardware sales fell in July to $282 million, the lowest since the pandemic. Physical disc spending hit a record low of $85 million. A standard Xbox Series X now retails at $800, against a $500 launch price in 2020.

GTA 6 is digital download only. CEO Strauss Zelnick said on the Aug. 7 call that discs no longer make sense and the business is well over 90% digitally distributed. GTA 5, released 13 years ago, is still a top-five seller every year.

Would you pay $800 for a console to play one game?

#GTA6 #TakeTwo #Gaming #Stocks #causeanuproar