Investors have to feel pretty good heading into tonight's Majesco Entertainment (Nasdaq: COOL) earnings call.
The stock more than tripled last year, and the video game company's already trading 21% higher through the first two weeks of 2011.
The success of Zumba Fitness and November's Zumba Fitness 2 sequel has given new life to the developer and publisher that would live and die between Cooking Mama releases. The irony here is that even though Zumba Fitness 2 came out in November -- and Microsoft's (Nasdaq: MSFT) Kinect for the Xbox 360 has reignited the popularity of dance and fitness titles -- Majesco's hottest selling title continues to be the original Zumba Fitness for Ninetndo's (OTC: NTDOY) Wii.
It's not as if Zumba Fitness 2 for the Wii or next month's Zumba Fitness Rush for the Xbox 360 would factor into tonight's report anyway. Majesco's fiscal fourth quarter ended in October, a couple of weeks before the Wii follow-up hit the market. However, the fact that the original console release continues to have legs is encouraging.
Analysts still see a profit of $0.03 a share out of Majesco, reversing a loss of $0.04 a share a year earlier.
The smart money has to be on a solid earnings beat. After all, just check out how Majesco's numbers have blown away the pros the first three quarters of fiscal 2011.
| EPS est. | EPS | Beat | |
|---|---|---|---|
| Q1 2011 | $0.11 | $0.20 | 82% |
| Q2 2011 | $0.07 | $0.13 | 86% |
| Q3 2011 | ($0.02) | $0.03 | 250% |
Source: Yahoo! Finance.
How often do you see a company blow away the prognosticators by at least 82% for three quarters in a row? The severity of the beats is accelerating, giving Majesco plenty of momentum.
Majesco did take a hit back in November, when privately held Impulse filed a patent infringement lawsuit against six Wii developers including Majesco. Impulse's claim is that it owns the technology for controlling in-game actions by manipulating a Wii Remote or Wii Balance Board in ways covered by its intellectual property. We'll see how this plays out, but there's no reason to be alarmed. Electronic Arts (Nasdaq: ERTS) and Nintendo were also named in the suit. If the country's second largest video game company and the console maker itself are in the crosshairs, you know that they'll be arming themselves with the best lawyers that money can buy.
Tonight should be a good night for Majesco, though the stock's heady gains leading into the announcement indicate that a decent trouncing is already being priced into the stock.
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