Sony Forecasts $1.1 Billion Loss as Hirai’s Revival Falters

I'm not pessimistic, just realistic ... in what reality is losing $1 billion in a fiscal year supposed to be celebrated? lol. Per the article:

Declining sales of key products are hampering Hirai’s revival efforts as the company struggles to find new hits that will attract consumers shifting to mobile devices from Apple Inc. and Samsung (005930) Electronics Co. The CEO already failed to meet his pledge to end TV losses after cutting at least 10,000 jobs previously and focusing the company on mobile devices, games and imaging products.

“Hirai lacks aggressiveness,” said Hideki Yasuda, an analyst at Ace Research Institute in Tokyo. “Sony needs to produce a new field for growth in order to increase its value.”

Operating income will be 80 billion yen this year, less than half its October forecast of 170 billion yen, while the sales projection is unchanged at 7.7 trillion yen, Sony said.

Ouch, that is a lot of red overall for Sony though.

First off... presentation slide 12.

Secondly the last few days of December I believe would count towards NEXT quarters numbers since it's part of the week that ends in Januray 4th.

Might wanna slow your roll before you haphazardlystart throwing around insults.

Not really. i realize people are spoiling to make PS4 look great but lets at least deal in facts. Game did a normal operating profit, better than some divisions, worse than some, but hardly exemplary.

it equals about 177 million dollars in operating profit.

It does say PS4 is probably close to break even at least, which makes MS look even worse for being $100 more and less powerful (though, Kinect)

Presentation slide only says 4.2 million in the first 6 weeks, which ended on the 27 Dec 13. Secondly, though some companies report based on week based quarters (integer number of weeks), Sony's  quarters are calendar based so the quarter doesn't end on the last full week of December, it finishes on the end of the calendar month (31 Dec). 

Having said all that, I really don't think another 4 days will make much of a difference, so its all a mute point. 

That's... exactly what i said, just phrased differently more or less.

The last few days actually count as next year in financial terms due to the week it ends in. (as in date year, not financial year.)

Dont blame me, blame my browser which didn't highlight any of those numbers when I ctrl+f'd it.

But thats the bit I'm disagreeing with, for Sony the fiscal quarter ends 31 Dec 13, not 27 Dec 13 because they use a calendar based quarter system (rather than a weekly based one). The first slide backs it up, it says Q3 2013 Consolidated Results - 3 months ended 31 Dec 13. If Sony used a week based quarterly reporting system, it would say 3 months ended 27 Dec 13. 

That would be true... IF they were only reporting on sales.

They aren't though.

Some things report daily, some are weekly some are even just montly.  So they may get shipping results at the end of each week, and something like financial results on a daily basis and utility bills at the end of a month.  In such a case you would end your month on the 31st.

Shipping reports are most likely a weekly report.

Assuming they actually shipped anything in a  4 window span anyway. 

(Remember sales = shipped to retailers).

My understanding from business's I've worked in (and I'm happy to be wrong), is that so long as the invoice is in and processed* by the end of the reporting period then its counted within that period. It doesn't matter how long a shipment takes, Sony doesn't care if the shipment makes it out the door or not, all they care is that the order from the retailer is received and processed. At that point the sale is made and can be counted. Though you said sales = shipped to retailers, in reality sales = sales to retailers, with the shipment happening 1-7 days later.

*Companies can do tricks to count orders and invoices received but not yet processed in the reporting period even if the processing takes place afterwards, so long as the amount of the invoice is known before the end of the financial period.

But as I said, it won't make much difference in this case (maybe 100k tops?) so its merely an academic discussion at this point.