59k two months post-Mario Kart is not "momentum". That's called sh*tty sales. 

Just because it was even worse last year doesn't make that number any better. 

The Gamecube never sold under 60k/month until like 2005 when Nintendo was winding it down. 

But it just goes to show my point -- what we consider a "decent/good" month for the Wii U ("momentum") would've been seen as a terrible month even for the GameCube. Which tells you a lot. Lowered expectations galore. Believe me there's no one at Nintendo's HQ in Japan that's happy with those sales. 

It is well above previous baseline even after 3 months, that is momentum.

And Gamecube was cheap from day 1, while Wii U is still held back by its price, which will eventually drop and no longer be a handicap.

I'm not really sure Nintendo will ever drop the price that much, they are manufacturing the system in such low quantities right now that they can't drop the price because their suppliers won't give them a break on the parts ... which are likely quite expensive because Nintendo insists on using very propietary hardware -- unlike the NES and SNES days under Yamauchi. 

I think their strategy now is they know that a lot of people aren't going to buy the system, so they're going to keep the price level, just because if they're headed to a 16-18 million LTD finish either way, there's no point in incurring unneccessary hardware losses just so you can hit that number a little faster than otherwise.

Their goal now likely is to get out of this nightmare of a generation without losing anymore money (3 consecutive years of operating losses) than they have to. 

This is just a system people don't want. All the Mario in the world (Mario fights! Races a go-kart! 3D! 2D!) ain't changing that. 

So you think it'll stay $300 for the majority of its lifespan? 

Well they may adopt the XBox 360 model of simply cycling in new bundles at the same price point rather than taking a price cut. At least for a while.

I mean shit, the PS3 and 360 are still pretty expensive, no one wants to cut their hardware margins anymore unless it's a last resort. 

I think internally Nintendo quietly knows there's no saving the Wii U, their plan now is just to not incur anymore damage to the company overall as a result of it until they can have Quality of Life and Fusion platform ready for 2015/2016 launches and hopefully fare a lot better. 

Guess we can only wait and see. As of May this year Wii U is no longer selling at a loss, so there should be room for a price cut if need be.

I believe that statement was also mistranslated/taken into the wrong context by some over zealous Nintendo fans. 

What other context is there? It doesn't sem that far-fetched to me that it could break even at $300USD when the hardware (even if its propriety) is rather low end.

Well basically Iwata never said that the Wii U wasn't being sold at a loss. People got hold of a Japanese Q&A financial briefing and mistranslated a bunch of his answers. 

When the officially translated English version was put up by Nintendo, it turned out Iwata didn't say what people thought he did. 

Logically too ask yourself if the Wii U is making a profit, and the 3DS is making a profit (that has actually been confirmed by Iwata), then how is Nintendo still losing money pretty much every quarter like clockwork? I mean they've had some big selling games like Pokemon X/Y, 3D World, Animal Crossing, etc. so that can't be the culprit. It has to be Wii U hardware that's negatively impacting their bottom line. 

R&D seems a likely culprit; first for Wii U, then for amiibo, then for the "new 3DS", and now probably for a Wii U slim or whatever they're cooking up next.