Nintendo Co. Ltd. has hit a huge landmark in its native Japan.
As shared by Stealth40K on Twitter, Nintendo’s market capitalization value has gone past $ 100 billion in Japan’s Nikkei stock market. This information comes from Nikkei’s stock trading information, and we can cite three websites that corroborate:
As of this writing, Nintendo is 7th ranked in terms of market capitalization. That still puts them below Japan’s other conglomerates like Toyota, Hitachi, Mitsubishi Financial, and Nintendo’s peer and rival, Sony Group. It also puts them above many other Japanese giants, such as Sumitomo, Softbank, Honda, Daiichi, Fujitsu, etc.
Stealth40K also adds some interesting context to this achievement. In 2016, in the fallout of Pokémon Go’s breakout success, Nintendo reached a market capitalization of $ 42 billion. Nintendo more than doubled its stock value at this point in time, but this wasn’t as straightforward as Nintendo’s stock value just going straight up.
In October of this year, Nintendo first revealed the original Switch and placed the spotlight on its launch title, The Legend of Zelda: Breath of the Wild. The Switch launched in 2017. Nintendo struggled with some supply issues by the end of the year, so that it slowly rolled the console out across the world in succeeding years. It may seem strange to think now, but there was definitely a period when the industry and gamers themselves weren’t sure if the Switch was going to be a success.
Nintendo was able to manage their reveal of the console efficiently, so that they relayed all the good news first and any negative news got litigated closer to release. Nintendo also did not have the support of most third parties at this time, relying mostly on their own titles, such as Mario Kart 8 Deluxe and Splatoon 2. The few third-party games were substantial in Minecraft, Skyrim, and Mario + Rabbids: Kingdom Battle, but there were more indie than AAA developers making games for the Switch.
We didn’t provide this summary of the Switch’s lifetime just to fill out the article word count, though. We can learn a lot about what’s the same and what’s changed then and now, and it’s mostly looking up for Nintendo. The Switch 2 is seeing the best lineup of third-party support it has seen since the Super NES. Its own first-party lineup is a complicated but impressive mix of new original titles, cross platform titles, and Switch games with Switch 2 upgrades. Nintendo didn’t have full control over the announcement and marketing rollout of the Switch 2, but it’s still in incredibly high demand, such that we can even cast doubt how many people are really unhappy with the bad news that’s come with the console.
This current rally in Nintendo’s stock value is ongoing in spite of the current market uncertainties from US tariffs, after Nintendo revealed higher prices for games, even in light of the controversy around Game-Key Cards. Everyone’s hopes are high that the Switch 2’s success will be big enough to rally the industry, that we could even hope it’s the beginning of the end for the three-year wave of layoffs and studio closures. With all this in mind, even if you’re not personally interested in the Switch 2, you have to hope for the best for Nintendo.
