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Yea, think this thread is about done at this point. Thanks for the chat. See you guys in six months.

 SoloFalcon1138 wrote:


If the best you have to contribute is a simplistic chat response, it may be best to keep quiet while the adults are talking. Even the posting rules tell you that.

What's the average length of your posts? About a sentence and a half usually? Fair play though a good attempt, the reply I was half-way through writing no doubt would have resulted in me getting banned, which was no doubt the desired effect.

@ Everyone: Please take a breather before continuing ITT. Remember, this is just a discussion about toy soldiers. Nothing we can legitimately discuss ITT is worth getting your blood pressure up or insulting other people. Thanks.

Hivefleet Oblivion wrote:
I have no idea if those breakdowns on Hasbro's internal sales are correct, that if indeed their games are growing so much faster than GW's.

But lest this page becomes an outpost of naysaying, it's worth comparing how the stock market values of Hasbro and GW compare. GW in blue; Hasbro in red.




Doubtless someone will be along soon to tell us how that red line is really higher than the blue one...
You can go to this link
and compare GW to whatever other business you like, simply click on the 'compare' button, then enter their name.

Hmmm... GW stock quote is in pence. Hasbro is in dollars. GW market capitalization is £246m. Hasbro market capitalization is $5.8bn. So, yeah, the red line really *is* higher than the blue one...

Valete,

JohnS

 silent25 wrote:

 frozenwastes wrote:
I knew Magic was bigger than GW. I was wondering where silent25 got the numbers he talked about earlier in the thread. Now we know, he or someone else made them up.

Pretty much every aspect of the hobby gaming industry (non-traditional board games, card games and miniatures) is growing except for GW. The smaller companies all talk about record growth and Hasbro shows tripling of unit sales for MTG. Fantasy Flight just keeps pumping out the product and X-Wing has been a runaway success. GW? They are stagnant.

I was conveying what Brandir was quoting on Warseer. I do not make up number. Still waiting for Sean to show where he got his numbers. Especially when reading analyst comments on financial sites that state Hasbro doesn't release numbers on the size of WotC. And these are dated after the supposed slide show.

And besides, GW is growing faster than Hasbro.

I gave the name of the report...should have come out in late February or early March if I recall correctly. I would need to scan it in to do anything more than I have already. I am sure someone on a My Little Pony, Transformers or GI Joe site has already scanned it in...so Google is your friend, otherwise you might find information on the Hasbro site, my copy came from my broker as he knows I have an interest in that sort of thing.

Keep in mind that GW is peanuts compared to real toy companies. Hasbro made $130 million in profit in the same quarter that ended when the slides came out on $1.28 billion in sales. Just one quarter. They are saturated in the 1st world countries and have little room left for growth there, while in developing countries (BRIC in particular) they have seen huge growth figures. Because of the saturation though, most growth is in those as well as less mainstream product lines (MtG for example).

GW on the other hand is really only at a saturation point in the UK. Even on mainland Europe, you have issues with their localization as well as availability of products outside of online sales. While a company like Hasbro is a mature stock that should be maintining slow growth and paying a hefty dividend (already made $1.20 per share this year with a likely 40 or 50 cents more to come) which will bring it to about twice what GW pays out, last year I think we got about $1.70 per share for the year as well.

Regarding comparing Hasbro to GW on the market graph, that is really disnegenuous. As mentioned already, the LSE is pence while the NYSE is whole dollars. Hasbro hasnt been valued at GW level in terms of stock prices since the Regan administration. While GW is dealing with millions, they are dealing in billions...not to mention that if you were to just look at twelve months or so of data, you would see it move more than GW has in the last 20 years. It is a high volume stock traded on a high volume market. Last summer, I think it was around $35 per share, now it is around $45 per share and it was at nearly $50 a month or two ago. So, yes, the little red line is indeed well above the little blue line. Far and away above the little blue line. I wouldnt be surprised to look into it more and see that more shares of Hasbro are traded in a single day GW shares traded in an entire year.

I just assumed yahoo finance would have compensated for currency differences. Looks like it didn't.

Correcting (div by 100)

GWs stock price is the equivalent of around $12 (USD).

So for your $12 (price of one share) you would have netted $.72 (per share in dividends last year.

For Hasbro, the shares are $45 each. Last year they paid $1.74 per share.

To compare them multiply the GW dividend by 3.75 which would be: $2.70. So better than Hasbro.


Of course, if you still have GW shares that were purchased back in say 2009 when it was MUCH lower then you are doing very well and the amount paid in dividends isn't what is really driving you... it's the upward price per share. Namely the average of $2.35/share per year increase since then; which is way better than Hasbro's results over the same time period.

clively wrote:
GWs stock price is the equivalent of around $1200.

Now consider this, for your $1200 (price of one share) you would have netted $1 (yes, one whole dollar) per share in dividends last year. Woo flipping hoo.

For Hasbro, the shares are $45 each. Last year they paid $1.74 per share.

So, if you had $1200 invested in Hasbro then you would have netted about $46 (forty-six dollars) in gains.... So yes, the red line is MUCH better than the blue one as far as people *investing today* see it. Of course, if you have GW shares from back when it was MUCH lower then you are doing pretty well and the pittance they paid in dividends isn't what is really driving you.

Dude, the GW share price is in pence, so its currently running at about $12.00 a share.

 frozenwastes wrote:
I just assumed yahoo finance would have compensated for currency differences. Looks like it didn't.

The currency difference doesn't matter. As a matter of fact comparing the stock price of 2 different companies has absolutely nothing to do with comparing the value. You have to look deeper; for example, comparing growth rates. In which case that red line trending up is a very very good thing.


Automatically Appended Next Post:

 azreal13 wrote:

Dude, the GW share price is in pence, so its currently running at about $12.00 a share.

stupid google on conversion rates. and silly me for not noticing it was "GBp" instead of "GBP"

The currency difference absolutely matters. Why? During the same time period the GBP lost 25% of it's value against the USD.

 Sean_OBrien wrote:

I gave the name of the report...should have come out in late February or early March if I recall correctly. I would need to scan it in to do anything more than I have already. I am sure someone on a My Little Pony, Transformers or GI Joe site has already scanned it in...so Google is your friend, otherwise you might find information on the Hasbro site, my copy came from my broker as he knows I have an interest in that sort of thing.

Yea, tried searching for the report by that name and by others, but no luck. Lots of pictures of figures and such, but no financial section. Not sure if my browsing history is messing that up.

Only picture I could find that was close a numberless growth chart:


Unfortunately nothing to verify your number.

Though on the HAS vs. GAW:L stock comparison, you can get several GW shares for the price of one Hasbro share. Should really compare say $1,000 worth of GW stock vs $1,000 worth of Hasbro stock. You'll end up with a much larger dividend check from GW. But I still sold min since I was expecting the stock to tank after the Hobbit. Still surprised it hasn't because the annual report was "disappointing".




Automatically Appended Next Post:

 frozenwastes wrote:
The currency difference absolutely matters. Why? During the same time period the GBP lost 25% of it's value against the USD.

Not sure where you are getting that 25% from? The peak GBP/USD during that period was ~1.64 and trough was ~1.49. For a 25% loss, it would have to be near 1.2.

 silent25 wrote:

Only picture I could find that was close a numberless growth chart:

Spoiler:

That's pretty impressive to nearly triple revenue in four years. And we're not talking about some small company like Corvus Belli who can have a good year breaking into new markets via the web and have 75% growth. We're talking an established game expanding it's player base even further and doing a great job retaining current customers.

As for the GBP, around 5 years ago, it was worth $2 or so USD. Now it's around 1.5-1.6 depending on the week.

 frozenwastes wrote:
[
That's pretty impressive to nearly triple revenue in four years. And we're not talking about some small company like Corvus Belli who can have a good year breaking into new markets via the web and have 75% growth. We're talking an established game expanding it's player base even further and doing a great job retaining current customers.

As for the GBP, around 5 years ago, it was worth $2 or so USD. Now it's around 1.5-1.6 depending on the week.

It's peak was 1.8 five years ago and that is still only a 15% drop over it's current value.

As for that growth, remember, Hasbro sells Magic in China. That is a huge market that no tabletop miniature game is currently competing it that I'm aware of.

So it looks like WotC/Hasbro has figured out how to break into China, but GW has not. I know they've been trying, but I'm guessing that without local independent stockists to take the risk in building the initial market, GW doesn't really know what to do to make it happen.

And yep, I didn't notice, but I had my currency thingy on CAD rather the USD.

We should also be honest here about comparing from a bottom to today. It's very, very rare for people to buy at the bottom of a given stock. I know that professionals like fund managers who bought GW in 2008 figured out it was a good buy, but to talk about GW's stock performance as if everyone bought in at the best possible time just isn't realistic as a point for comparison. Someone might have bought just a bit earlier and saw their 400p stock plumet to 200p very quickly. And had the dividend canceled as GW issued a profit warning. Small company's stocks are very volatile (hopefully anyone who bought in at 400p held on and now have doubled their money).

If anyone has bought into GW in the last 5 years, great move! What's your exit plan? Under what conditions would you sell? Buy more?

 frozenwastes wrote:
So it looks like WotC/Hasbro has figured out how to break into China, but GW has not. I know they've been trying, but I'm guessing that without local independent stockists to take the risk in building the initial market, GW doesn't really know what to do to make it happen.

Well to be fair that what happen with a Marketing Department, if GW would spend the money they have a much better shot.

 Sean_OBrien wrote:



Regarding comparing Hasbro to GW on the market graph, that is really disnegenuous....

Now, I hold no brief for GW, and am not necessarily defending their management practices, but I am constantly surprised at the attempts to twist the facts to suggest they're doing badly when in fact they're doing well.

GW's share performance is better than that of Hasbro. The price of the share is completely irrelevant as a single criterion - it only matter whether it's rising or falling, and how it relates to earnings per share and of course to market cap. GW's share price has performed far better than Hasbro, who we've heard about recently, and it's an illuminating comparison. GW is generally seen as a model of good corporate governance. People here hate Kelly - but he's doing a decent job, as that feature in the Telegraph - interpreted here as negative, due to extreme selection bias - demonstrates.

Of course the market cap is relevant - Hasbro is indeed a far bigger company. But beyond dividends, which as pointed out are far higher for GW than Hasbro, GW's actual financial performance is far better, if you look at return on equity. Hasbro's is 22.7 per cent - GW's is 34.1 per cent. 34 per cent is a fantastic figure.

Despite all the naysaying here, GW is perceived in the market as a well-run company, and the figures back it up.

The whole corporate strategy is focussed to keep share price up for another 2 years, because the CEO and chair is a major shareholder and gets 1 Mio GBP per year out of this and retires in 2 years. So short term good shareholder value is not astonishing. People here argue that lack of growth, flat revenue, constantly less sales and customers are not good.

Ive just noticed that GW Gamesday has been moved back to the smaller NIA venue .
A negative indicator to me

From the newsletter " the NIA offers great convenience and will make for a richer experience. "

 Dynamix wrote:
Ive just noticed that GW Gamesday has been moved back to the smaller NIA venue .
A negative indicator to me

From the newsletter " the NIA offers great convenience and will make for a richer experience. "

I've been waiting for a chance to use this!

A richer experience for Tom Kirby