No One Knows What Game Is GameStop Playing

Last week, GameStop GME surprisingly topped revenue estimates for its third quarter. However, the video game retailer widely missed analysts' earnings guidance. Once again, it limited its earnings conference call to just management's prepared remarks, without allowing Wall Street to ask any questions during a call that ended up being an eight-minute reading.

Third Quarter Results- Spending Money to Make Money

Although revenue rose 29% to just under $1.3 billion, coming close to its 2019 position when it generated $1.4 billion in sales, GameStop saw losses widen significantly in the period to $1.39 per share from $0.53, far worse than the $0.58 per share loss analysts were anticipating. Overall net loss grew to $105.4 million.

Expenses jumped to $421.5 million which is expected as the company is investing heavily in being able to confront an online and digital future of gaming. Moreover, inventory rose to $1.14 billion as the company is stocked for the holidays as opposed to $861 million at the end of last year's comparable quarter. However, it should be noted that Black Friday that tends to bring the peak demand isn't included in these results.

Infrastructure Investments

GameStop recently opened a new customer care facility in Florida for which it hired 500 employees. The facility has been presented as a key element of its future growth plans but it's only one of several infrastructure investments the company has made recently, including two large fulfillment centers in Nevada and Pennsylvania or more precisely, additional 1 million square feet of warehouse space that is being stocked with merchandise. Considering the supply chain issues hampering other retailers, this spending is justified ahead of the holiday season. But the video gaming company still did not reveal its exact plans for all that space.

GameStop is Set to Become the "Amazon of Gaming"

GameStop entered the year with three distribution facilities and added new fulfillment centers in York, Pennsylvania, and Reno, Nevada, along with the customer care center in Florida. Building out this massive footprint with Amazon-sized centers is essential to realizing chairman Ryan Cohen's vision.

So, while Cohen and CEO Matt Furlong isn't saying it out loud as Furlong only teased GameStop has "been exploring emerging opportunities in blockchain, NFTs, and Web 3.0 gaming", the company's actions speak for themselves.   It would have also been nice to hear more about its partnerships with Samsung, LG Display Co Ltd LPL, Razer Inc RAZFF, Vizio Holding Group VZIO, Logitech (NASDAQ: LOGI), and Asus management previously teased.

The Verdict

GameStop is a company undergoing a transformation from a brick-and-mortar chain into an e-commerce retailer. But this turnaround is taking place in an environment shaped by escalating costs that are causing the company to burn through twice as much cash compared to a year ago. Unfortunately, management is practically not any particular insight into what it is doing to engineer this business turnaround.

However, in times when so many companies used opaque reporting in the past to cover up fraud, simply saying buzzwords and catchphrases is never as good as actually shining light on the company's actions. In addition, a recent Kotaku report shows the discontent of store workers who say they are overworked and understaffed. Fortunately for the company, it seems small investors are patient and are trusting the leadership of former Chewy.com CHWY founder Ryan Cohen who made billions selling pet food online. He brought former Amazon.com, Inc AMZN executives on board, and since then, GameStop has reduced online shipping times for games from weeks to days. For now, it seems investors are giving him space to do what is necessary for GameStop to reverse course – only time will tell if Cohen's strategy can win the game.

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