Stable high demand for the PlayStation 5 game console provoked the growth of Sony’s operating profit in the first quarter more than a quarter. According to CNBC, the income of the corporation before taxes and other obligatory deductions increased by 26.3 percent.
Fiscal year in Japan lasts from April 1 to March 31. According to the Sony report, the owner’s operating profit for the first three months of this year was 280.1 billion yen ($ 2.56 billion). A year earlier, this figure was 221.7 billion yen (2.02 billion dollars).
The new Prefix PlayStation 5 Corporation presented in November 2020. In a pandemic, the console has gained great demand, and the sales of the company remain steadily high for several months. Refinitiv analysts surveyed by financial service predicted the average profit of Sony at $ 207.96 billion (1.899 billion dollars) in the first quarter. Similar expectations were also inside the Corporation – management extended to reduce the popularity of its devices and content as a quarantine relaxed associated with coronavirus.
However, due to the new waves of the incidence of COVID-19 around the world, many restrictions still remain in force. Assessing the situation, video game holding experts raised the expected income by the end of the fiscal year to 980 billion yen (8.95 billion dollars). The forecast grew by 50 billion yen – before the emergence of new data in March analysts were expected to see the profit of $ 930 billion (8.49 billion dollars).
Nevertheless, the financial director of Sony Hiroki Totoko declared a possible obstacle to the extension of the production of PlayStation 5 and other electronic devices. It consists in the global shortage of semiconductors caused by trade wars of corporations and a pandemic. Totocho stated that for this reason Sony probably will not be able to fully satisfy the growing demand for the gaming consoles. In May, the company stated that it was planning to sell 14.8 million consoles in the current fiscal year.