Activision Blizzard's fourth-quarter net profit increased by 60% year-on-year."Overwatch Pioneer" becomes a god assist

thanks to last year's acquisition of King, the developer of popular mobile game Candy Crush Saga, Activision Blizzard's revenue surged 49% in the fourth quarter of 2016 to a company record of $2.01 billion, according to foreign media reports.

original title: Activision Blizzard's fourth-quarter net profit increased by 254 million US dollars compared with the same period last year

according to foreign media reports, thanks to last year's acquisition of King, the developer of popular mobile game Candy Crush Saga, Activision Blizzard's revenue surged 49 percent in the fourth quarter of 2016, reaching a company record of 2.01 billion US dollars.

Activision Blizzard is currently the largest video game publisher in the United States by market capitalization. In the fourth quarter ended December 31, revenue rose 49 per cent from a year earlier to a record $2.01 billion, while net profit rose 60 per cent to $254 million, according to results released on Thursday.

Activision Blizzard acquired King, the developer of Candy Legend, a year ago. Compared with the same period last year, the deal increased Activision's revenue by $436 million in the fourth quarter of last year. Activision Blizzard said that the average revenue per user of King games increased in the fourth quarter compared with the previous quarter and compared with the same period last year.

Activision Blizzard also said that thanks to the popularity of the multi-role shooting game Overwatch, they spend a record amount of time on games in its Blizzard division. Since its release in May last year, the number of registered players of "Watch Pioneer" has exceeded 25 million.

driven by better-than-expected results, Activision Blizzard shares rose nearly 10% in after-hours trading, the highest since October last year.

but not all Activision Blizzard's businesses are doing well. Revenue at Activision, which accounts for nearly half of the company's revenue, fell 23 per cent in the fourth quarter compared with the same period a year earlier. The call of Duty series, developed by Activision, was still the best-selling video game in the US in 2016, but the company did not disclose sales figures for call of Duty 13 (Call of Duty: Infinite Warfare) during last year's holiday shopping season in the face of competition from rival EA Battlefield 1 (Battlefield 1). At the beginning of the fourth quarter of last year, Activision Blizzard warned that call of Duty 13: unlimited War may not perform as well as the previous generation.

Activision Blizzard's earnings per share rose 57% year-on-year to $0.33 in the fourth quarter. For the whole of 2016, Activision Blizzard's revenue rose 42 per cent to $6.61 billion, while net profit rose 8.3 per cent year-on-year to $966 million, or $1.28 per share. Activision Blizzard's digital revenue rose 94% year-on-year to $4.87 billion in 2016.

however, Activision Blizzard's fourth-quarter adjusted revenue was $2.45 billion, or 92 cents a share, according to general accounting standards. The company's fourth-quarter results beat market expectations. According to a Thomson Reuters survey, market analysts had on average expected Activision Blizzard to earn 73 cents a share on revenue of $2.35 billion in the fourth quarter, not in accordance with general accounting standards. Activision Blizzard expects revenue of $1.55 billion and earnings per share of $0.25 in the first quarter of 2017.

Edit: nancy