The article is a joke and so is Forbes.com and Forbes magazine.

Those valuations really don't mean anything.  Nintendo in 2009 had an enterprise value of  40 billion, now it is 5 billion.    Over the next few years that brand number for Xbox, especially if PS4 keeps killing them will dwindle to nearly nothing.   It's a very volitile market.  Brands of things like food stay pretty even.  Things like Video Games, not so much.  Pretty much anything in the entertainment industry will be that way,  due to it being something that constantly needs new products to enjoy continued success.  Pepsico. on the other hand will continue to sell Mountain Dew and Pepsi regardless.  Same product being sold over and over.

Nintendo is its own brand. With MS's ego, I can't see them doing it without some sort of brand recognition.MS has its own culture too.

I had a feeling that it would be a "contributor" writer who wrote this piece. I believe we need to stop linking to articles written by contributors. This isn't an article written by Forbes editors.

The only thing Nintendo would want from Microsoft is Halo and their Rare titles back. This writer doesn't understand very much outside of sales. Nintendo would run everything Microsoft stood for in terms of competitive gaming into the ground. 

Not really.   Sure Wii U consoles arn't selling great right now, but we all know for a fact that games like Mario Kart, Smash Bros, Zelda, Animal Crossing, and Donkey Kong will sell great.   The only Xbox game that I know will sell great is Halo, and even at that, it will be interesting to see how the Market responds to Halo on Xbox One, when they put out 5 separate releases of it on Xbox 360.   The market already crashed for Gears of War.  Forza 5 is not doing that great.  Ryse didn't do that great.   Microsoft barely has any 1st party software, and that is what brings in the money.  

Pretty much.  I could no doubt see Nintendo get the Rare titles back so at the very least they could put the old titles (DKC, DK64, Banjo, Conker, Diddy Kong Racing), on the eshop and then make a new Banjo game, or maybe do something with the Kremlins again.   Halo on Nintendo would be freaking massive.  Honestly if it wasn't for Halo, I would have never bought an Xbox 360.   Gears was cool, but it was more of my Halo appetizer.   If Nintendo had all of their own 1st party stuff along with Halo, then the Nintendo vs. Sony war to ensue would be insane.

The market didn't crash for Gears the last game was a prequel that is why it didn't sell well.  As for Forza 5 its doing pretty well its the thrid highest selling X1 title I'm pretty sure no one expected it to sell more the COD: Ghosts or Battlefield 4.  Also if you really want to see a game that crashed look at the numbers for Wii Fit U.

360 did make a lot of money, but it also lost a lot of money in its early years. OG XBOX lost a ton of money.

XBONE isn't doing good right now. Titanfall and Halo can/will help, but at the moment it's similar to the OG XBOX or the 360 early in its life. I highly doubt they're making money off the system right now. Console launches themselves are super expensive and the as of late low sales aren't helping. Investors could be more worried about the losses today than the potential returns five years from now.

I think the XBOX vision of being a home entertainment hub is the main reason why Microsoft won't give up the division. If it was just about money they would have ditched the brand a long time ago.