By Kwanwoo Jun


Netmarble's shares fell at the sharpest pace in about one year, after reporting below-consensus quarterly earnings amid a lack of new game releases.

Shares of the South Korean videogame company fell 10% to close at 58,200 won ($43.72) on Friday, the steepest daily percentage drop since May 13, 2022, underperforming the benchmark Kospi's 0.6% loss for the day.

The selloff in Netmarble came after it posted Thursday a net loss of KRW45.80 billion for the quarter ended March, much wider than a FactSet-compiled consensus estimate of a loss of KRW18.88 billion.

Revenue fell 4.6% from a year earlier and operating loss widened 137% on year, it said.

The company has remained in the red since the first quarter of 2022, and market analysts largely expect a potential profit turnaround could come only in the third quarter of this year at the earliest.

Hyundai Motor Securities analyst H.Y. Kim on Friday downgraded the stock to market perform from buy and cut its target price by 5.6% to KRW68,000.

Netmarble's successful releases of "Seven Deadly Sins" and four other titles, which were recently approved for publication in China, would be crucial to turning a profit, the analyst said.


Write to Kwanwoo Jun at kwanwoo.jun@wsj.com


(END) Dow Jones Newswires

05-12-23 0530ET