VIDEOGAMES

Achievement Unlocked: Record Earnings Season for Videogames

Any gamer who’s had 5+ sorority sisters ask their advice on buying a Nintendo Switch can confirm: Videogame companies had a monster quarter amid the pandemic. Here’s the breakdown from their Q2 earnings this week: 

Nintendo had its best April–June quarter since the Wii hit peak popularity in ’08. Its profit surged 428% yearly thanks to Animal Crossing converts who bought almost 6 million Switch consoles...all so they could spend 60 hours pulling virtual weeds.

Activision Blizzard demolished revenue expectations, because when gardening didn't provide a sufficient escape from reality, people turned to Call of Duty: Warzone, World of Warcraft, and Overwatch. However, some Blizzard employees were disappointed their petition for better pay and benefits wasn’t included in the optimistic earnings call. 

Electronic Arts (EA) reported a 21% uptick in revenue. In the same way that Arby’s has the meats and FX has the movies, EA has the sports: FIFA Soccer and Madden NFL both increased their player bases by more than 100%. The Sims 4 also now has more than 30 million players. 

Take-Two Interactive’s revenue surged 54% to a company record of $831 million. Its most popular title, Grand Theft Auto V, has sold 135 million copies to date. 

Epic Games, the company behind Fortnite and the Unreal game engine, is private so it didn’t report earnings...but it couldn’t be left out of this week’s action. Epic closed a funding round with big-name investors such as Sony and Fidelity that boosted its valuation to $17.8 billion.

The thread tying it all together?

With the exception of Animal Crossing, last quarter’s growth was fueled by consoles and games released as many as seven years ago. Players have been running red lights in GTA V since 2013 and devising elaborate Sims 4 cheating scenarios since 2014.

• Microsoft and Sony’s earnings reports confirmed the pattern. Both said their profits were buoyed by sales of current-generation consoles and games sold on them. 

Looking ahead...Activision Blizzard’s CEO predicts “economic uncertainty” could end the gaming industry’s speedrun. But any Q3 slump could be reversed by a huge Q4: Microsoft and Sony will release their latest consoles—the Xbox One X and PlayStation 5, respectively.

LEGAL

Going for the Big Guns

Buckle up, this one’s got business, politics, alleged corruption, and guns. Following an 18-month investigation, NY Attorney General Letitia James filed a lawsuit yesterday seeking to dismantle the National Rifle Association, the country's most influential gun rights group, alleging "years of illegal self-dealings.”

The lawsuit accused two former execs, along with CEO Wayne LaPierre and General Counsel John Frazer, of using the nonprofit as a “personal piggy bank” to fund family vacations and private jets and to enrich close associates. 

• LaPierre allegedly used NRA reserves for eight trips to the Bahamas, luxury car services, and hair and makeup for his wife.

The rebuttal: NRA President Carolyn Meadows called the suit a "baseless, premeditated attack on our organization.” President Trump said it was a “very terrible thing” and that “the NRA should move to Texas and lead a very good and beautiful life.”

Zoom out: From internal power struggles to a growing deficit, the NRA’s dealing with severe financial challenges. Now it's facing a substantial legal battle that could last years. 

TRANSPORTATION

What an Über-raschung

In its Q2 earnings report yesterday, Uber offered the first comprehensive picture of how COVID-19 lockdowns impacted a business model built on cramming into Toyota Corollas with strangers. 

The anchor: Uber’s rideshare business caved in, with Q2 bookings falling 73% annually. 

• The optimistic outlook for Uber’s OG business is that subway-wary travelers will opt for private rides. But the recent uptick in U.S. cases could keep people from traveling on any mode of transit. 

The lifeboat: Not even a pandemic gets in the way of Taco Tuesday. Uber Eats bookings were up 113% last quarter, pushing revenue to $1.2 billion. It's the first quarter Uber’s food delivery unit surpassed its ride-hailing business.

• So why stop now? In July, Uber announced it’s acquiring Postmates for $2.7 billion. When the deal closes next year, it'll give Uber 37% of the U.S. food delivery market. 

Big picture: As we've seen with other companies (Disney), the pandemic has turned core businesses into side gigs and side gigs into core businesses.

SPONSORED BY HINT WATER

Water That Will Tickle Your Fancy

The difference between tap water and “fancy” spring water has always eluded us. TBH, bubbles or not, they’re both boring. Water is water, right?

H₂nOpe.

The moment Hint’s delicious, lightly flavored, fruit-infused water touched our lips, our lives went from treating H₂O as sustenance to savoring it with class and elegance.

Not only is Hint a superb alternative to boring tap water and sugary drinks, it’s a cordial invitation to a flavor soirée the likes of which your palate has never tasted. It bears what the French might call a certain “Je ne sais quoi.”

See how fancy we’ve become?

The point is: If you’re looking for something to tickle your own fancy, your fancy can have three cases of Hint’s top flavors—like watermelon, blackberry, and cherry just to name a few—delivered straight to your door for just $36. 

That’s just one dollar per bottle and free shipping for new customers. 

Get the fanciest deal around.

PERSONAL FINANCE

When You Jump in a Lake, You Get Wet

And when you give people money, they use it to pay off their debt. 

Yesterday, the New York Fed reported that despite a historic economic downturn, overall U.S. household debt decreased $34 billion in Q2, the first drop in six years.  

Why? Social distancing restrictions eliminated boozy brunch, decimating the market for impulse purchases. Kidding...kinda. 

• Since we’re barely leaving the house, we’re not piling up purchases on our Visas. Plus, the government padded checking accounts with a one-time direct payment and supplemental unemployment benefits, helping people slash their credit card balances.
• And slash they did. Credit card debt plummeted by $76 billion, the steepest decline on record. 

Mortgage debt, on the other hand, ballooned to almost $10 trillion. Record-low rates brought hordes of borrowers to Refinancing Lane—but overwhelmingly those in the pristine credit club. 

Looking ahead...nothing gold can stay, especially with the unemployment rate above 11%. Banks have been squirreling away massive financial cushions against loan defaults, indicating they don't think this debt reduction party can last. 

QUIZ

The FitnessGram Pacer Quiz

Whether you read every word of the Brew 3x over or just skimmed the headlines, our Friday news quiz is the perfect way to catch up on what happened this week. And then tease your friends when they get 1/5. Take the quiz here. 

WHAT ELSE IS BREWING

• President Trump ramped up his attack on Chinese tech companies. In executive orders, he barred U.S. “transactions” with TikTok owner ByteDance and WeChat owner Tencent starting in 45 days. 
• Rocket Companies, the parent of mortgage lender Quicken Loans, began trading publicly yesterday after downsizing its IPO. 
• NBCUniversal booted the chairman of its NBC Entertainment division, who was being investigated over accusations he oversaw a toxic work environment. 
• Apple's stock is on a tear. Next stop...$2 trillion market cap? 
• Snapchat is trying to get more young people registered to vote.
• The investment chief at CalPERS, the U.S.’ largest pension fund, resigned unexpectedly Wednesday.
• The power of Microsoft: About 27 human genes have been renamed in the past year because Excel misread their symbols as dates.

BREW'S BETS

Learn a new language faster than you can say oui oui. Babbel’s #1 selling language app lets you speak a new language in as little as three weeks. Get 50% off during Babbel's 13th Birthday Sale today.*

Watch a star-studded webcast. UBS’s Paula Polito spoke with Billie Jean King, Lisa Leslie, Paulina Porizkova, and Elaine Welteroth to discuss how women can get on the path to financial independence. Watch the replay and see the latest findings in UBS’s Own Your Worth report here.*

Follow Friday: 

• Thrifting: Awoke Vintage, Goodshop Badshop, and funkyythrifts for clothing. Stooping NYC for streetside furniture in the five boroughs.
• Drifting: Top Yacht and The Yacht Guy. But more importantly, read this now-outdated article about the strange lives of yacht influencers.

Audience participation alert: Each Friday, we share our favorite social media accounts about anything and everything. Next week, it’s your turn to curate. Instagram, TikTok, Reddit, Facebook pages or groups, YouTube—it’s all fair game. Recommend your favorite accounts here.

^{*This is sponsored advertising content}

FRIDAY PUZZLE

Today's theme: Ten. Each of the following clues refers to a word that begins with "ten." Can you guess all 10 of them?

1. Inclination
2. Delicate or gentle
3. A sinew
4. A racket game
5. Capable of being stretched
6. Between the bass and alto
7. Stretched tight
8. Unsubstantial
9. A dwelling
10. An opinion held to be true

FRIDAY PUZZLE ANSWER

1. Tendency
2. Tender
3. Tendon
4. Tennis
5. Tensile
6. Tenor
7. Tense
8. Tenuous
9. Tenement or Tent
10. Tenet

Source: The one and only Braingle