The fund cut its stake after the Japanese gaming company suffered a decline in sales of its biggest product.
Saudi Arabia’s Public Investment Fund has reduced its stake in Japanese gaming giant Nintendo to 4.19% from 5.26%, Reuters reported.
Saudi Arabia’s Public Investment Fund has reduced its stake in Nintendo, after the Japanese gaming company suffered from falling sales of its biggest products.
Nintendo slowdown
Nintendo is facing a slowdown in the console gaming market and an aging product in its flagship Switch hybrid console — its best-selling system ever, which has sold 143.4 million units worldwide.
In the company’s first fiscal quarter ended June 30, Nintendo reported a 46% year-over-year decline in Switch sales.
The Japanese company sold 2.1 million units in the three-month period, down from 3.91 million units a year ago.
Savvy Games Group is tasked with developing the gaming and esports industry in Saudi Arabia through strategic investments and acquisitions, such as the recent $5 billion deal for Scopely, the developer of Monopoly Go.
Aside from the games themselves, the investment group also says it has a 40% share of the global esports market share.
Saudi Public Investment Fund
The Public Investment Fund of Saudi Arabia was established by royal decree of King Faisal bin Abdulaziz Al Saud in 1971 as a mechanism to invest on behalf of the government.
In July 2014, the Public Investment Fund was granted permission to finance new companies inside and outside Saudi Arabia, either independently or in cooperation with the public and private sectors.
The Public Investment Fund is aligned with the Saudi government’s Vision 2030 to diversify the economy, and is one of the largest sovereign wealth funds in the world, with total assets of US$930 billion.
More than 60% of PIF’s investments are within Saudi Arabia, including mega projects such as NEOM, Vision City, Amaala, and Qiddiya, in addition to ACWA Power, Maaden, Riyadh Aviation, Saudi National Bank, and Saudi Tadawul.
PIF’s international investments include Accor Group, Americana Group, Blackstone, Jio Platforms, Lucid Motors, Selfridges Group and Uber.
