Take-Two Beats on Latest Quarterly Earnings; CEO Remains Mum on ‘GTA 6’ Release Date but Touts ‘Lucrative’ Gearbox Deal

variety.com:

Jennifer Maas TV Business Writer Take-Two Interactive revealed a beat on its latest quarterly earnings results Thursday, but no news regarding an exact release date for “Grand Theft Auto 6.” After announcing during its May earnings call that its highly anticipated Rockstar Games title was targeting a Fall 2025 launch, Take-Two did not narrow that window down further this quarter.

And as to whether the video game company will reveal the date in its next quarterly check in this fall, CEO Strauss Zelnick told Variety, “I guess we’ll see.” Wall Street forecast a loss of earnings per share (EPS) of 2 cents on $1.25 billion in net bookings for Take-Two’s Q2, according to analyst consensus data provided by LSEG, formerly Refinitiv.

Take-Two reported non-GAAP EPS of 5 cents on $1.22 billion in net bookings. Net loss for the quarter was $262 million. These results do not yet showcase the full impact of Take-Two’s acquisition of “Borderlands” developer Gearbox, a transaction that closed in June. “It’s so far de minimis because we have, of course, the results of their primary titles in our numbers already, because we publish those titles already, and we only close the deal in June,” Zelnick said in an interview ahead of the release of the financial results. “But we do expect it’ll be a very lucrative deal.” Those predictions aren’t based on Take-Two’s hopes for the “Borderlands” movie releasing Friday, which is shaping up to misfire with $12 million to $16 million in its first weekend of release on a production budget of roughly $115 million as well as marketing and distribution costs of $30 million.

When asked about any expected revenue from the film, Zelnick said: “I’ve said all along that the value of those licenses is.