GameStop holiday sales nearly flat

Grapevine, Texas -- GameStop Corp. on Monday reported nearly flat sales for the nine-week holiday period that ended on Dec. 31. Total sales were $3.02 million, or about the same as last year. Same-store sales slipped 0.3%.

The company backed its fourth-quarter and full-year earnings guidance.



Video game software sales were up nearly 10% to $1.47 billion, but sales of game consoles and other hardware fell.



Paul Raines, CEO, commented, "During the holiday, our solid sales performance of new high-def console software was offset by weak Wii software sales and hardware sales due to the lack of new hardware offerings versus the 2010 period. We were pleased with the performance of our buy-sell-trade business, digital offerings and mobile initiatives. GameStop also retired the remainder of its long-term debt establishing a debt-free balance sheet as we go into 2012."