After blockbuster Microsoft deal, gaming giants are still sitting on $45 billion cash hoard

cnbc.com:

Publicly listed gaming companies are sitting on a $45 billion pile of cash and cash equivalents — and that could lead to greater consolidation in the $188 billion video games market, according to a new report from venture capital firm Konvoy, which was shared exclusively with CNBC.

The likes of Activision Blizzard, Electronic Arts, Singapore's Sea, Japan's Nintendo and Bandai Namco, South Korea's Nexon, and China's NetEase, currently hold $45.1 billion in cash and cash equivalents, according Konvoy, which cited these companies' latest public reports.

That would give them more than enough financial firepower to look at potential acquisition targets that could help them build out their intellectual property and products.

In particular, gaming firms are looking to keep gamers more engaged for longer with live-service games that add more content over time and paid subscription packages that offer a certain amount of free games and access to cloud gaming, or the ability to play games via the cloud rather than downloading them to their machines.

Publicly listed gaming companies had a fairly rosy year in 2023, on the whole.

The VanEck Video Gaming and eSports ETF, which seeks to track MVIS Global Video Gaming & eSports Index, has climbed 20% in the year to date, according to Konvoy. The blue-chip S&P 500 index, by contrast, has climbed close to 12% year to date.

The Global X Video Games & Esports ETF, which aims to track a modified market-cap-weighted global index of companies in video games and esports, hasn't performed as well, slipping 0.4% since the start of 2023.

Big Tech firms are also primed with plenty of cash to consider more gaming deals, according to Konvoy.

The VC firm said that the world's biggest tech firms which