Global Hardware Nov 22 to 28 - Switch Dominates Black Friday Week

[Fight-the-Streets]

Calendar year vs. fiscal year and shipment vs. sell-through - these are the essential questions to struggle with. For us in the West it's normal to think in Jan. - Dec. terms, that's how we calculate, how we feel the year. However, in Asia (at least on Corp. side) the year more often than not consists of Mar. - Apr. It's the fiscal year that counts for them and nothing else. It is in fact the only metric that counts when we make comparisons. Although it's fun and logical for us in the West to compare sales of calendar years, it is irrelevant, fiscal year is the one to go. On the other, I don't think console sales differ much between calendar and fiscal year. If your holiday quarter sucks you can't make it up in Jan. - Mar. to bolster your fiscal year. Same for calendar year: If you holiday quarter is gigantic, a simply modest Q1 earlier in the year can't bring the review of the year down.

Regarding shipment vs. sell-through: Of course only the consoles that actually end in the hands of the consumer (or scalper, it's a sell-through after all for the console manufacturer) are of interest. However, as company usually only give out shipment numbers, it's the one and only metric that counts for comparisons.

Why I come up with all these: I just see that those two classifications cause lots of trouble on forums such as VGChartz. It's logical for the average mind that as soon as it reads or hears about sales numbers it logically interprets them as sell-through numbers. Same for a year: Our (western) mind is conditioned since early childhood to think in Jan.-Dec. terms. Everything else is illogical for us. To be honest, it took me into early adulthood, when I started to be interested in sales numbers of gaming companies, reading financial reports etc., that I actually found out that the fiscal year isn't necessarily the same as the calendar year.

What I ultimately want to say with this post is that if we make (semi-) professional sales comparisons, i.e. the backbone of VGChartz, we should use the most precise metrics available from direct sources. Direct sources of course are the financial reports of the console makers (or the publishers for software) themselves and the most precise metrics they give us to work with are fiscal year numbers and shipment numbers! Everything else (though interesting as well) is just fanboy talk!