TTWO - NASDAQ
Take-Two Interactive Software, Inc.
TTWO·NASDAQ
$215.80
-3.0%Communication ServicesElectronic Gaming & Multimedia
Take-Two Interactive Software, Inc. develops, publishes, and markets interactive entertainment solutions for consumers worldwide. The company offers its products under the Rockstar Games, 2K, Private Division, and T2 Mobile Games names. It develops and publishes action/adventure products under the Grand Theft Auto, Max Payne, Midnight Club, and Red Dead Redemption names; and offers episodes and content, as well as develops brands in other genres, including the LA Noire, Bully, and Manhunt franchises. The company also publishes various entertainment properties across various platforms and a range of genres, such as shooter, action, role-playing, strategy, sports, and family/casual entertainment under the BioShock, Mafia, Sid Meier's Civilization, XCOM series, and Borderlands. In addition, it publishes sports simulation titles comprising NBA 2K series, a basketball video game; the WWE 2K professional wrestling series; and PGA TOUR 2K. Further, the company offers Kerbal Space Program, OlliOlli World, and The Outer Worlds and Ancestors: the Humankind Odyssey under Private Division; and free-to-play mobile games, such as Dragon City, Monster Legends, Two Dots, and Top Eleven. Its products are designed for console gaming systems, including PlayStation 4 and PlayStation 5; Xbox One; the Nintendo's Switch; personal computers; and mobile comprising smartphones and tablets. The company provides its products through physical retail, digital download, online platforms, and cloud streaming services. Take-Two Interactive Software, Inc. was incorporated in 1993 and is based in New York, New York.
At a Glance
Live SnapshotMarket Cap$40.07B
EPS-1.6200
P/E Ratio-133.21
Earnings Date08/06/2026
Earnings Call Transcript
TTWO • 2026 • Q4
Operator
Hello, and thank you for standing by. My name is Tiffany and I will be your conference operator today. At this time, I would like to welcome everyone to the fourth quarter and fiscal year 2026 Take-Two Interactive Software results call. All lines have been placed on mute to prevent any background noise. After the speakers' remarks, there will be a question-and-answer session. If you would like to ask a question during that time, simply press star, then the number one on your telephone keypad. I would now like to turn the call over to Nicole Shevins, Senior Vice President, Investor Relations and Corporate Communications. Nicole, please go ahead.
Nicole Shevins
Good afternoon. Thank you for joining our conference call to discuss our results for the fourth quarter and fiscal year 2026, and to March 31, 2026. Today's call will be led by Strauss
Nicole Shevins
These important factors are described in our filings with the SEC, including the company's most recent annual report on Form 10-K and quarterly report on Form 10-Q, including the risks summarized in the section entitled Risk Factors. I'd also like to note that, unless otherwise stated, all numbers we will be discussing today are GAAP and all comparisons are year-over-year. Additional details regarding our actual results and outlook are contained in our press release, including the items that our management uses internally to adjust our GAAP financial results in order to evaluate our operating performance. Our press release also contains a reconciliation of any non-GAAP financial measure to the most comparable GAAP measure. In addition, we have posted to our website a slide deck that visually presents our results and financial outlook. Our press release and filings with the SEC may be obtained from our website at take2games.com.
Nicole Shevins
Now, I'll turn the call over to Strauss.
Strauss Zelnick
Thanks, Nicole. Good afternoon, thank you for joining us today. I'm pleased to report that we concluded fiscal year 2026 with excellent results, including fourth quarter Net Bookings of $1.58 billion, which was above the high end of our guidance range. Net Bookings for the full fiscal year were $6.7 billion, which was approximately $750 million above the initial guidance we provided last May. NBA 2K delivered record Net Bookings and recurrent consumer spending.
Strauss Zelnick
Fiscal 2027 is poised to be a breakout year for Take-Two, led by the November 19th release of Grand Theft Auto VI, arguably the most anticipated entertainment property of all time. We're excited that Rockstar Games will start their marketing campaign this summer. Our initial financial outlook for Fiscal 2027 includes record Net Bookings of $8 billion-$8.2 billion. This reflects meaningful growth over last year, led by the launch of Grand Theft Auto VI, along with the successful execution across our entire portfolio. We expect to sustain this higher level of scale and generate strong cash flows well into the future as we release our robust long-term development pipeline and capitalize on new opportunities across our highly established, multifaceted business. Turning to highlights from the quarter, I'll begin with our fantastic mobile performance.
Strauss Zelnick
Toon Blast grew approximately 25% year-over-year as Peak introduced new events and features, including Temple Guardians, Deep Quest, and refined level experiences. Match Factory continued to perform, with players responding positively to its live service execution and a continuous pipeline of player-friendly features, such as the collectible album. Empires & Puzzles outpaced our forecast and grew 5% over last year, driven by a robust slate of in-game events celebrating the title's ninth anniversary. Color Block Jam grew 15% year-over-year and remains the highest grossing title in Rollic's history. Top Eleven delivered its strongest quarter ever after 16 years in market, driven by superb performance of the Bundesliga and live operations innovation.
Strauss Zelnick
2K's mobile offerings posted another solid quarter, with WWE SuperCard reaching nearly 39 million lifetime downloads, NBA 2K Mobile continuing to expand its audience, NBA 2K26 Arcade Edition maintaining its top five position on the Apple Arcade charts, and NBA 2K All-Star in China growing to nearly 10 million registered users after just one year in market. Our direct-to-consumer channel continues to drive Net Bookings and margin growth as we integrate additional mobile titles from our portfolio and deepen our relationships with players by reducing payment friction and enhancing the end-to-end user experience, which is generating improvements in conversion and customer loyalty. As the regulatory landscape continues to evolve, we're even more confident in the sustainability and growth profile of this platform. The Grand Theft Auto series continues to outpace expectations significantly and demonstrate incredible momentum leading up to the launch of Grand Theft Auto VI on November 19th.
Strauss Zelnick
Recurrent consumer spending grew 5% year-over-year with strong engagement in GTA Online, driven by A Safehouse in the Hills, one of the best-performing updates in its history. This content offering provided a wide range of community-requested features, including mansion properties, the return of Michael De Santa from Grand Theft Auto V, all new missions, vehicles, exclusive GTA+ benefits, and the powerful new Rockstar Mission Creator that allows content creators to make their own GTA experiences. Sales of Grand Theft Auto V advanced further with nearly 230 million units sold in to date. GTA+ continues to see significant growth year-over-year, led by the holiday update and highly attractive monthly benefits such as the inclusion of NBA 2K26 in its games library.
Strauss Zelnick
In addition, Rockstar Games' Red Dead Redemption 2 achieved its highest level of annual unit sales since its launch year, with over 85 million units sold in to date. During the quarter, our sports offerings also performed well. NBA 2K26 continued to expand its audience. To date, the title has sold in over 10 million units, representing a 5% increase over NBA 2K25. Recurrent consumer spending grew 10% as we benefited from higher daily active users and games played per user. In keeping with our strategic focus on innovation, Visual Concepts launched Season 5 for NBA 2K26, their first-ever college-themed offering featuring 16 iconic universities, which was welcomed by NBA 2K's vast community and provided a glimpse of what's to come in college basketball for next year and beyond.
Strauss Zelnick
I'd like to thank our partners at the NBA and the NBA Players Association for their continued engagement and support in our collective mission. On March 13th, 2K and Visual Concepts launched WWE 2K26, which was well received by critics and consumers alike. Engagement has been excellent, with recurrent consumer spending up 20% year-over-year and more than 85 million matches played, an increase of 7% compared to WWE 2K25. 2K is supporting the title with multiple updates through its Ringside Pass. I'd like to thank Nick Khan and his team at TKO for their unwavering support and partnership as we continue to evolve this series further for fans of the game. PGA TOUR 2K25 enjoyed a fantastic resurgence.
Strauss Zelnick
2K captured an influx of new players and drove strong organic interest by aligning Season 5 with the start of the PGA Tour season in January and including the title in PlayStation Plus. During the quarter, our consumers played 60 million rounds of golf, representing a 110% increase over the third quarter. 2K will support the franchise throughout the year with several more content updates. In closing, we're incredibly excited by the promise of our future for our players, our organization, and our shareholders. This year has the opportunity to be a major inflection point for our company, defined by groundbreaking entertainment experiences, creative and operational excellence, and record Net Bookings.
Strauss Zelnick
With our flexible balance sheet, our strong cash position, and our expectation that we'll generate over $1 billion in operating cash flow this fiscal year, we believe that we're extraordinarily well-positioned to take measured creative risks, to pursue accretive M&A, and to invest in technology that will unlock greater creative capabilities and operational efficiencies across our organization. I'm immensely proud of our teams and exceedingly optimistic that we'll continue to drive greater success and shareholder value for the long term. I'll now turn the call over to Karl.
Karl Slatoff
Thanks, Strauss. I'd like to thank our teams for another strong quarter and for laying the groundwork for an exciting chapter in our company's history. We are extremely optimistic about our upcoming pipeline, which includes 29 titles through fiscal 2029. In the interest of precision, we are now only counting mobile games in our pipeline that have been specifically scheduled for worldwide launch within the three-year window. Our teams continue to develop and test many new titles not reflected in this outlook, some of which may be added to our multi-year count. Fiscal 2027 is set to be a milestone year, led by the launch of Grand Theft Auto VI on November 19th. We plan to release six additional titles during the fiscal year, including two mobile titles, three sports titles, which are NBA 2K27, PGA TOUR 2K27, and WWE 2K27, and one platform extension.
Karl Slatoff
Our labels will also continue to provide new content and experiences that drive engagement and recurrent consumer spending across many of our previously released titles. Looking ahead, we currently expect to deliver 22 titles throughout fiscal 2028 and 2029, including one mobile title, five sports titles, three core new IPs, and 13 core existing IPs, which includes seven sequels and six remakes, remasters, and platform extensions. We look forward to sharing more about our groundbreaking pipeline, which we believe will drive a new period of growth and long-term returns for our shareholders. I'll now turn the call over to Lainie.
Lainie Goldstein
Thanks, Karl, good afternoon, everyone. Fiscal 2026 was an exceptional year for Take-Two as we achieved record Net Bookings and operating performance. Each of our labels significantly outperformed the initial forecast we provided last May as our teams maintained their focus on product innovation and delivering the highest levels of quality and value. I'd like to thank our teams for their passion and dedication as we embark on this milestone year, marked by the highly anticipated release of Grand Theft Auto VI and strength across our core businesses. Turning to our results, we delivered fourth quarter Net Bookings of $1.58 billion, which was above the high end of our guidance range of $1.51 billion-$1.56 billion. This reflected better than expected performance from the Grand Theft Auto series, several mobile titles, and the Red Dead Redemption series.
Lainie Goldstein
Recurrent consumer spending growth was strong, increasing 7% over last year and accounting for 82% of Net Bookings. This included 7% growth for mobile and 5% growth for Grand Theft Auto Online, both of which surpassed our expectations. NBA 2K increased 10%, which represented one of the strongest fourth quarters in franchise history, but was softer than anticipated as trends moderated from the extreme growth we achieved during the second and third quarters of the year. During the quarter, we launched Sid Meier's Civilization VII for Apple Arcade, PGA TOUR 2K25 for Switch 2, and WWE 2K26. GAAP net revenue increased 6% to $1.68 billion, while cost of revenue declined 5%, $741 million. Operating expenses decreased significantly to $928 million, as last year included a $3.6 billion impairment expense related to goodwill and acquired intangible assets.
Lainie Goldstein
On a management basis, operating expenses declined 2% year-over-year, which was favorable to our guidance due to lower marketing expenditures, some of which shifted out of the period. For fiscal 2026, we achieved Net Bookings of $6.72 billion, which was above the high end of our guidance range of $6.65 billion-$6.7 billion. Recurrent consumer spending grew 17% and accounted for 78% of Net Bookings. NBA 2K grew over 30%, mobile increased 13%, and Grand Theft Auto Online increased 6%, all sharply exceeding our initial May guidance. Operating cash flow was $624 million compared to our forecast of $450 million, reflecting our fantastic fourth quarter. We spent approximately $163 million in capital expenditures, which, due to timing, is favorable to our forecast. GAAP net revenue rose 18% to $6.65 billion and cost of revenue increased 11% to $2.8 billion.
Lainie Goldstein
Operating expenses decreased significantly to $3.9 billion due to the impairment charges that I mentioned previously from last year's fourth quarter. On a management basis, operating expenses rose 7% year-over-year, which represented strong leverage over the prior year. Today, we are providing our initial outlook for fiscal 2027. We project Net Bookings to range from $8 billion-$8.2 billion, which reflects approximately 20% growth over fiscal 2026, primarily due to the launch of Grand Theft Auto VI on November 19th, along with successful execution across our entire portfolio. The largest contributors to Net Bookings are expected to be the Grand Theft Auto series, NBA 2K, Toon Blast, Match Factory, Empires & Puzzles, the Red Dead Redemption series, Words with Friends, Color Block Jam, and
Lainie Goldstein
Our recurrent consumer spending forecast assumes NBA 2K is up high single-digits, the Grand Theft Auto series is up, and mobile is down due to last year's success of Color Block Jam and our assumption that trends will moderate for several of
Lainie Goldstein
On a management basis, we expect operating expense growth of approximately 8% year-over-year, which represents significant leverage over fiscal 2026. This growth is largely due to higher marketing expense to support the launch of Grand Theft Auto VI and our new mobile releases, as well as higher R&D costs. Moving on to our guidance for the fiscal first quarter. We project Net Bookings to range from $1.32 billion-$1.37 billion, compared to $1.42 billion in the first quarter last year. The largest contributors to Net Bookings are expected to be NBA 2K, the Grand Theft Auto series, Toon Blast, Match Factory, Empires & Puzzles, the Red Dead Redemption series, Color Block Jam, Words with Friends, and
Lainie Goldstein
We project recurrent consumer spending to decline by approximately 3%, which assumes high single-digit growth for NBA 2K and declines for mobile and the Grand Theft Auto series. We expect GAAP net revenue to range from $1.45 billion-$1.5 billion and cost of revenue to range from $578 million-$594 million. Operating expenses are planned to range from $926 million-$936 million. On a management basis, operating expenses are expected to grow by approximately 3% year-over-year, primarily driven by a modest increase in personnel costs.
Lainie Goldstein
In closing, fiscal 2027 will introduce a new level of operating performance, which we expect to sustain well into the future, driven by a robust pipeline and expansion opportunities across our core franchises. With our focus on incorporating new technologies and tools, we feel confident in our ability to scale our business, generate operational efficiencies, and leverage the power of our balance sheet, which we believe will drive long-term shareholder returns. Thank you. I'll now turn the call back to Strauss.
Strauss Zelnick
Thanks, Lainie and Karl. On behalf of our entire management team, I'd like to thank our colleagues around the world for their commitment to excellence and to our strategy of being the most creative, the most innovative, and the most efficient company in the entertainment industry. To our shareholders, I want to express our appreciation for your continued support. We'll now take your questions. Operator?
Operator
At this time, if you would like to ask a question, press star, then the number one on your telephone keypad. To withdraw your question, simply press star one again. We will pause for just a moment to compile the Q&A roster. Your first question comes from the line of Eric Handler with Roth Capital Partners. Please go ahead.
Eric Handler
Good afternoon. Thanks for the question. Lainie, just a couple things within the guidance. Looks like, at least on a non-GAAP basis, your operating expenses are looking, let's call it for round number purposes, about $3.8 billion. That's a $300 million incremental increase on a year-over-year basis. How much of that is due to marketing? When you look at the trend for the next couple of years for G&A and R&D, what do those trajectories look like? I assume they'll be much smaller than the revenue growth.
Lainie Goldstein
Yes, that's correct. We expect to have a lot of leverage over the next couple of years as we continue to scale the business. For the $300 million higher for this coming year, about 1/2 of that is for selling and marketing expenses for the entire company as we have significant marketing for our entire pipeline of titles that are coming out this year.
Eric Handler
Okay. That's helpful. As a follow-up, how should we think about RCS? Once GTA VI comes out, how are you thinking about the trajectory of GTA Online when that game is launched?
Lainie Goldstein
Rockstar will provide more details on the GTA series when they're ready to talk about that.
Strauss Zelnick
I think you're asking though-
Eric Handler
Okay.
Strauss Zelnick
... what do we expect will happen with recurrent consumer spending regarding GTA Online?
Eric Handler
Correct.
Strauss Zelnick
I think to say that everyone has been pleased by the ongoing trajectory of GTA Online, Red Dead Online, the sales of GTA V, the sales of Red Dead would be a great understatement. These titles have proven to be vastly more resilient than anyone expected, and I think it's a reflection of the quality of the work that Rockstar has done. Despite the fact that Grand Theft Auto V has been in market for three console generations, it continues to sell. It's now up to 230 million units. Red Dead is up to 85 million units. We're so extraordinarily pleased with how Rockstar's titles have performed. It's difficult to know exactly how Grand Theft Auto Online will do after the release of Grand Theft Auto VI, but certainly it will stay in market and certainly there are many consumers who love the title.
Eric Handler
Thank you. Very helpful.
Operator
Your next question comes from the line of Colin Sebastian with Baird. Please go ahead.
Colin Sebastian
Thanks. Congratulations on the year. I have a couple of questions as well. I guess first off, as cash flow and flex per the guidance for the coming fiscal year, how are you guys thinking about cap allocation between returning to shareholders versus other uses? I have a follow-up.
Strauss Zelnick
This will sound boringly consistent with our answer to this question. It's the same as it has been for as long as we've been in the position of having positive cash flow and positive cash balances. There are three uses of our capital here. First, to support organic growth. This company's story has largely been an organic growth story, and we certainly have expectations for organic growth in fiscal 2027, and we believe that fiscal 2027 is setting a new benchmark, a new standard for this company going forward. That's all organic. As you can see from our numbers, we have to invest to be in a position where we can grow in that way. Our balance sheet and our P&L allows us to do just that. Well, that'll continue.
Strauss Zelnick
The second use of our capital is very selectively when it makes strategic sense, and let me emphasize this, when it's accretive. We are willing to engage in inorganic opportunities. The most recent meaningful one was, of course, the acquisition of
Strauss Zelnick
We've already said in this release today that we expect to be in a net cash position by the end of the fiscal year. Finally, we return capital to the shareholders when it makes sense. So far, we've done that through share buybacks, and they are opportunistic. We believe that share buybacks make sense for our shareholders when they are executed at deep value. Our last buyback was done at $158 a share. We'll see how the stock opens tomorrow, but I think no matter what, that was pretty good plan on our side. Look, like all stocks, they move around different price points. Our stock traded down as low as, I think, $195 in the last six weeks. There is an opportunity to return capital to the shareholders when it makes sense.
Colin Sebastian
Thanks for the reminder on those, Strauss. I guess maybe as a follow-up, and maybe some of the structural issues in the industry, including sales of current gen consoles, I'm just curious how that impacts your thinking or your assumptions in terms of establishing pricing and pre-order expectations for titles like GTA VI in the coming year. Thank you.
Strauss Zelnick
I'm sorry, what would the relationship be from your point of view?
Colin Sebastian
The number of the install base of hardware may not be as high in this current console generation as it might otherwise have been. Certainly value price points for certain titles have done well versus premium pricing. Those considerations.
Strauss Zelnick
Look, when we look at pricing, I would not say we look at it in the context of the install base. We absolutely look at pricing in the context of the property itself. What we want to do in every situation, whether that's console, mobile, PC, frontline, or catalog, is deliver to the consumer vastly more entertainment value than what we charge. We want the consumer to have a great experience. We think a consumer experience is the intersection of what you get and what you pay for it. Probably a great example of that is Mafia: The Old Country, which is a terrific title. It's not some 100-hour experience, it's not a 50-hour experience. We priced the title at $50, and consumers were thrilled, and we had a massive hit on our hands.
Strauss Zelnick
I suspect we could have priced it at a higher level. We wanted to make sure that consumers loved it, and part of loving something is feeling good about what you paid for it.
Operator
Your next question comes from the line of Doug Creutz with TD Cowen. Please go ahead.
Doug Creutz
Hey, thank you. I wanted to ask in the context of your guidance at mobile, you're assuming is down this year based on some attenuation in the performance of older games. Is that based on anything you're seeing in the year to date, or is that more of a, hey, these are older titles, let's be prudent in our outlook. Similar to, I think for many years, you guys have sort of said, we expect GTA Online to be down because it's a many-year-old live service game, and then it would typically do better. Can you just give some context around that? Also what you might be assuming for your two new mobile launches within that guide. Thank you.
Strauss Zelnick
It's a very fair question. We had a great year at
Strauss Zelnick
Our guidance would typically reflect our expectations around the marketing spend in the year, because we would never guide around doing something silly. In the mobile business, if you're getting bad immediate results from a marketing spend, you stop doing it. Our dev costs are pretty manageable in the mobile world. I would say unlike, say, console, where you have a big release go. I'm not going to give you the example you want. We have Basketball coming up. We know how many units it sold so far, 10 million units sold in to date. We know the prior year, the year before that, we have a sense of the market. We can estimate that pretty well within a band. With mobile, we just don't have the ability to do that.
Strauss Zelnick
I think you've correctly intuited that our mobile numbers would not include an expectation for some massive new release hit.
Doug Creutz
Very helpful. Thank you.
Operator
Your next question comes from the line of Cory Carpenter with JPMorgan. Please go ahead.
Cory Carpenter
Good afternoon. I had two questions on NBA 2K. Clearly, I think record year for the franchise this year. Hoping you could expand a bit on the trends you saw in the quarter. I think they moderated, you said in the prepared remarks, a little more than you'd expected. What did you see there? Then, Karl, maybe could you talk a bit about the engagement that you saw with the initial college basketball rollout? Thank you.
Karl Slatoff
Who wants to go first?
Lainie Goldstein
For NBA, this was one of our strongest quarters for Q4 in the franchise history. In terms of looking at our expectations, this reflects the extreme growth of Q2 and Q3, where we saw a high concentration of spending from our most engaged players early in the year, which left less upside opportunity heading into Q4. That's really what we saw in Q4 this year.
Karl Slatoff
On the college piece, we are very excited about our college release for Season 5. I would describe it at this point as it's a taste of what's to come. We did a deal that features 16 universities. It's basically validated our expectations and the opportunity that we think could be very meaningful for us going forward. The short answer is stay tuned. It's very exciting for us, and we're very happy how things have turned out so far.
Cory Carpenter
Maybe as a follow-up, Strauss, on the last earnings call, Google's Genie had just launched in beta. There's been some conversations more recently around the ability for AI to perhaps create GTA VI in a couple of months. I know this is a bit of a generic high-level question you've touched on before, but just given this remains a pretty big debate among investors, I thought it'd be helpful to hear your latest views just around what you're seeing in AI and how you expect it to change the gaming industry and Take-Two in particular. Thanks.
Strauss Zelnick
We remain enormously optimistic. Technology helped build this company. Video games are created largely inside computers and always have been. When I started in the video game business in 1993, we were making 32-bit games, and they certainly didn't look anything like they do today, and that's all driven by tech. I think the sort of confusion surrounds a belief that somehow more efficient asset creation puts us at some disadvantage or creates a competitive advantage for someone else, and I just don't believe that's the case. To the extent that technology allows anyone to do a better job in asset creation, naturally, we'll avail ourselves with the same technology. If you take a look at the tech in-market that is currently licensed for the creation of video games, it's licensed broadly. No one exclusively licenses technology for video games.
Strauss Zelnick
If a competitor has access to AI and that allows someone to do something better, quicker, cheaper, then we would have access to the same thing. The second point that I've made that I would stand behind is that the asset creation is not the same as hit creation. The entire story around the Gemini release was, wow, you can create assets that look like video games more easily than you could before. I hope that's true because that'll benefit us naturally. We have a three-part strategy: be the most creative, be the most innovative, be the most efficient. Seems to me that even if it doesn't help with creativity, it certainly should help with efficiency and innovation. That could be thrilling, but we do have to remind ourselves, asset creation is not the same as hit creation.
Strauss Zelnick
The best example of that is there are thousands of new mobile releases a year, but there's a handful of new mobile hits a year, and we make some of them. Despite the fact that everyone has access to the same tech because everyone licenses exactly the same underlying technology for the creation of mobile titles as we do. I remain highly optimistic. Now I'll give you a real-world example. I was visiting one of our studios, and they showed me some advertisements that they were putting together to advertise their games. These were live-action ads, and they were funny and cute, 15-30-second ad units that you've seen a zillion times. They were all created with AI, licensed AI, [audio distortion] AI. The script was done in-house for free. Well, by people, colleagues who work at the company already.
Strauss Zelnick
The AI software was used. The entire cost of making the spot was zero. Previously, we hired third-party companies to actually create those with human beings, and those spots could cost $25,000, $50,000, $100,000. Now, please note, not only were we not interested in reducing our head count to make this happen, we didn't have the opportunity to reduce our head count to make this happen. The entire marketing team at this particular studio is two people. They're doing a great job. What AI has allowed them to do is be more efficient, make great stuff, and do it cheaper. This is all a benefit to our company.
Cory Carpenter
Thank you.
Operator
Your next question comes from the line of Chris Schoell with UBS. Please go ahead.
Chris Schoell
Great. Thank you. Strauss, I believe it was a few quarters ago, you mentioned your expectations for GTA VI continued to increase. Any updates you can provide on your general expectations and levels of confidence for the franchise based on the indicators you have at this point, and how do you expect that this title will perform relative to GTA V? Lainie, I know there's a lot of noise to margins this year with the marketing and the software amort, I believe I heard you said there's a lot of leverage over the next few years, can you just remind us how you're thinking about the ability to return to the historic margin levels that Take-Two used to see? Thank you.
Strauss Zelnick
I don't recall the comment you alluded to. I think I've always said the same thing, which is how could we not be? We're all extraordinarily excited about what Rockstar Games is working on. We're all incredibly enthusiastic about the upcoming release. Equally, this is a management team that never claims success before it occurs. I'm pretty sure that every time we've had the luxury of having a conversation about an upcoming release that looked good, I've said we absolutely never opine on how high is up. We certainly work toward the best result and hope for the best result. That is out of our hands. What's in the hands of Rockstar from a development point of view and a marketing point of view is trying to make the best entertainment property they possibly can and then bringing it effectively to consumers all over the world.
Strauss Zelnick
That's what we aim to do, and we do feel really, really good about it.
Lainie Goldstein
Margin improvement remains a key priority in our financial strategy, but we recognize that margins will fluctuate over time based on a variety of factors. In fiscal 2027, we're reaching a new level of operating performance, which we expect to sustain well into the future, driven by a robust pipeline and expansion opportunities across our core franchises.
Lainie Goldstein
As we operate at this new level and generate operational efficiencies through reduction efforts and leveraging new technologies, including AI, we aim to enhance our margin profile over time. If you think about our operating expense leverage, it represents our largest opportunity, which we believe we can achieve as we grow our scale, both organically and inorganically. We've mentioned previously that gross margins of many of our titles are affected by the increasing cost of development. We've been making many structural improvements, including the driving efficiencies and reducing expenses. You've seen some of that coming through the P&L in the last couple of years and the leverage we've seen in the last year in terms of our operating expenses. Also, the D2C efforts in mobile, that's also working towards improving our margins.
Lainie Goldstein
This was a year where we scaled the business meaningfully and we achieved strong leverage on our expense structure. We'll continue to do that as we look into the future.
Chris Schoell
Thank you.
Operator
Your next question comes from the line of Andrew Marok with Raymond James. Please go ahead.
Andrew Marok
Hi. Thanks for taking my questions. Maybe one on the Rockstar Mission Creator. I know Strauss called that out in the prepared remarks as an interesting factor. I guess, are there any learnings from the early days of that and some of the recent missions that were created as you look to scale UGC in some of your Rockstar properties? I have a follow-up.
Strauss Zelnick
Look, we're trying to meet players where they are. To the extent that people want to have a hand in creation, there are numerous opportunities for them to do so. I just think it's incredibly exciting and our company embraces these advances. We're not precious about what we do here. We're open-minded. Another example of that is the FiveM business, where this started as sort of a business that was outside of our four walls. Now it's a business that's inside our four walls, and we're thrilled that it is.
Andrew Marok
Okay. Thank you. Maybe one more on mobile, if I could. I know that there has been some kind of correlation between the mobile business and macroeconomic factors in the past. I guess, what level of conservatism might you be baking into the guide around general economic conditions as it relates to the mobile business? Thank you.
Strauss Zelnick
Well, look, we're not economists, although we certainly have a point of view about where the economy is going, and that is one of the factors we consider when we build guidance.
Operator
Your next question comes from the line of Matthew Cost with Morgan Stanley. Please go ahead.
Matthew Cost
Hi, everybody. Thanks for taking the question. Strauss, there's a comment you made in the prepared remarks about your expectation to sustain higher levels of scale going forward. Just given the potential for Grand Theft Auto's performance this year, that's a high bar to clear going forward. As investors think about the opportunity to sustain your scale off of that base, how should they think about the mix between just an ongoing significant revenue contribution from Grand Theft Auto versus the pipeline that you went into some good detail on the prepared remarks discussing? I have one follow-up. Thank you.
Strauss Zelnick
It reminds me of my SATs. It's box D, all of the above.
Matthew Cost
Okay.
Operator
Your next question comes from the line of James Heaney with Jefferies. Please go ahead.
James Heaney
Great. Maybe just diving in again on mobile. It's just been impressive to see continued growth of Toon Blast and Match Factory as kind of the biggest drivers for the segment. I was just hoping you could go in some detail about the unique drivers across those franchises that you think have sort of enabled them to continue growing this far after the initial launch. Thanks.
Strauss Zelnick
Well, actually very different. Toon Blast has been around for a really long time. Match Factory is relatively new. Match Factory last year was still in growth mode. We projected that it would moderate, and we'll see what actually happens. Toon Blast is a legacy title, with regard to Toon Blast, what you're seeing is a title where the consumers who are involved are getting more and more involved. That's a reflection of the content that Peak is putting into the game and offers that are made to consumers. Basically with regard to a legacy title where you may not have a sharp growth curve on DAUs, you will have an effort to actually serve the consumers we have much more effectively, and I think that's what you're seeing in Toon Blast. Match Factory is still in pretty steep early.
Strauss Zelnick
It's not that old a title. They're very different. We need to be muscular in both areas. We need to be able to run our live services businesses really well for a long time, and
Strauss Zelnick
When you add it all up and we do a good job across the board, you get the kind of year that we got last year, and we now expect to make a meaningful step up. Driven largely by the launch of GTA VI, also driven by performance of the rest of the business. We expect to set that as a new base from which to grow, that's a reflection of firing on all cylinders.
Strauss Zelnick
Undoubtedly, we'll have some lapses along the way. We don't know where the lapses will be. If history is any guide, we'll also have some titles that will meaningfully beat expectations going forward. Part of our three-part strategy of being the most creative, the most innovative, and the most efficient is indeed to be the most innovative. If you look at the history of the company, we've been a leader in innovations, whether that's cross-development or marketing. I have no doubt in the coming years, we'll be able to innovate further.
Strauss Zelnick
I don't know exactly what form that'll take, I would just note that this company doesn't look anything like it did 19 years ago, despite still being in the interactive entertainment business. Lots of what we do here didn't even exist back then. This industry, never mind the company, is still on a sharp growth curve in terms of its cohort of engaged consumers and the opportunities to do new things and bring those new things to people in new ways.
James Heaney
Helpful context. Thank you.
Operator
Your next question comes from the line of Jason Bazinet with Citi. Please go ahead.
Jason Bazinet
I just had a quick historical question. In the past when you've been confronted with these big titles like, I don't know, whether it was GTA IV or V or the last two Red Deads, how accurate would you say your firm, your management team was in terms of predicting how well these titles would do? Were there some that sort of disappointed or others that really beat, or were they sort of all within a pretty tight confidence interval in terms of your own internal expectation?
Strauss Zelnick
With regards to the titles you mentioned, as it happened, they all performed better than we had expected. We've had plenty of other titles that disappointed, candidly. Thankfully, not of late.
Jason Bazinet
Okay.
Strauss Zelnick
They tend to be few and far between. It would not be accurate to say that our expectations were always exceeded. Not accurate in the least. That's why we are, I think, appropriately humble around here. This is the entertainment business. It is unforgiving. We try our hardest. We do not always succeed.
Jason Bazinet
Understood. Thank you for that color.
Operator
Your next question comes from the line of Alec Brondolo with Wells Fargo. Please go ahead.
Alec Brondolo
Yeah. Hey, thanks so much for the question. I appreciate it. I think I want to maybe try to ask Colin Sebastian's question in a little bit of a different way. I think that there's been a lot of conversations in the industry over the last several months about the growth of Roblox, the growth of lower-priced games on Steam in the $10-$20 price point. It seems like it's mostly driven by younger gamers. Obviously Take-Two doesn't participate meaningfully in those categories. You have a couple of lower-priced games in the $50 range, like Mafia. I think the question is what is the level of confidence that the newer cohort of gamers will graduate into more premium AAA experiences over time?
Alec Brondolo
I think the question is, is the young person that's playing Roblox, are they going to want to play $80 Grand Theft Auto VI when they grow up, or might they be habituated onto lower fidelity titles? Any thoughts there would be helpful.
Strauss Zelnick
Actually, it's the contrary. When entertainment properties are aimed at children, I don't know if you have children, but right around the age of 10 or 11, they do not want to be children anymore. They want to be teenagers. One of the issues, and this is not by way of being critical of anyone else in the industry, but one of the issues with children's programming, whether that's linear entertainment or interactive entertainment, is that children reach a certain point, they don't want to be engaged with kids programming anymore, even if it's appealing to them. It's not that a certain kind of kids-oriented interactive entertainment is necessarily a feeder to what we do in certain parts of this company. Remember, we also do make plenty of entertainment around here that's available for all audiences.
Strauss Zelnick
With regard to our M-rated titles, it's not necessarily the case that something else is a feeder to it. It's a different business. It is a business that is only available if you're 17 or above. I think if you engage with interactive entertainment and you're 17 or above, it's very difficult for me to imagine that you wouldn't be incredibly interested in our M-rated titles, specifically one that is coming up.
Alec Brondolo
Perfect. Thanks so much.
Operator
Your next question comes from the line of Eric Sheridan with Goldman Sachs. Please go ahead.
Eric Sheridan
Thanks so much for taking the question. Maybe building on two of the topics we've talked about on the call so far, with respect to mobile advertising and building additional optimization around user acquisition, how are you thinking about the signals as more mobile advertising becomes driven by AI and machine learning with respect to either being able to deploy more dollars at a higher return on ad spend or possibly becoming more efficient with respect to advertising? If possible, I have a quick follow-up.
Strauss Zelnick
Well, we certainly try to do that. We work with AppLovin and we are trying to optimize, of course, our return on ad spend. Sometimes things are going really well in the market. Other times, we're frustrated in the market depending on what's going on. There have been moments, for example, when we really couldn't get out there and spend because we could not find inventory at a price that made sense. There are other times when we can do that. That changes. It's our job to make sure that we understand the payback period on what we're spending, and we have very tight guidelines about that. You have to be on top of it all the time because when you spend money in mobile, as you know, you're spending it based on an expectation, and you'll earn it back over a period of time.
Strauss Zelnick
That expectation is based on a prior history, prior history isn't always dispositive with regard to what happens in the future. We are constantly, on a daily basis, tuning up our models that will inform how we spend money on user acquisition. As I said, sometimes it's greater, sometimes it's lower. We also have this weird anomaly, which I'm sure you're aware of, which is if we're out of the UA business for a period of time because we don't like it, of course, we make more money because there's no UA that's spent that comes back the same day in its entirety. Sometimes you get a really quick payback period.
Strauss Zelnick
We have had experiences where the payback period has been as quick as 90 days. I don't think we talk publicly about our expectations around the payback period in general, let's just say I think we're more conservative than most. To answer your question, are there new opportunities to be more efficient in this area? Yes, I believe so. Of course, it's not lost on anyone that after Apple changed their attribution characteristics, the entire industry was challenged. You can see from our own results with
Eric Sheridan
Great. If I could just ask one more. With respect to your approach to go to market with DTC, any new learnings about what the opportunity set might look like or the ceiling of that opportunity might be to grow the percentage of mix from DTC over time? Thanks so much.
Strauss Zelnick
Look, I've been saying for a long time that I thought both sort of the competitive landscape and the regulatory landscape would be favorable with regard to our overall distribution costing and taking as part of our overall distribution cost, our D2C cost, which is materially lower than third-party costs, but multiplied by the share of market related to DTC. We have said that that share has been growing. We have not talked about what percentage it is or where it's going. What we want to make sure, though, is two things. Number one, we want to be where the consumer is. The goal of this company is not to control distribution. The goal of this company is to make hits and bring them to consumers wherever they are, however they want them, and of course, to do so on economic terms. We value our third-party retailers greatly.
Strauss Zelnick
We especially value them when they provide marketing opportunities for us. We understand that there's a value in the marketing that third-party retailers can provide, and that would intersect with how much they charge us for access to their consumers. The more value a third-party retailer provides to us from a marketing point of view, the more comfortable we are working with them. At the same time, there is a role for direct-to-consumer opportunities. For us, it's all of the above.
Operator
Your next question comes from the line of Mike Hickey with StoneX. Please go ahead.
Mike Hickey
Hey, Strauss, Karl, Lainie, Nicole. Congrats, guys. A great year and a great guide. Very exciting. Just two questions. Strauss, first, I think you referenced before being astonished by Rockstar's marketing creativity. Clearly, they've got precedent there. Can you talk, I guess, philosophically about how Rockstar thinks about building anticipation for a game launch of this scale and how beneficial that marketing effort can be in terms of sustaining or even building demand around the current GTA ecosystem, and if that ancillary benefit is baked into your guidance? I have a follow-up.
Strauss Zelnick
Well, look, thanks for the question. I'm obviously not going to go into detail. What we've said about marketing GTA VI is that marketing will start this summer. As you know, any information around releases and marketing comes from our labels, and that shouldn't be news to you. That said, do we see in any release, no matter how highly anticipated it is, both the need to market the title and the opportunity in marketing the title? We do. I was asked about this earlier, and because I absolutely refuse to use a title of ours as an example, I used someone else's. I said, there's a new release of Mission: Impossible, and it's starring Tom Cruise. We all know what that looks like. I, for one, am going to see that movie. I'm going to see that movie.
Strauss Zelnick
Paramount still spends a whole lot of money to market that to make sure that people know it's out and it's great and it's worth seeing. I think that's the story of the entertainment business. I don't think there's any situation where one can expect to have a massive hit and not engage heavily in the marketing. I think that will be true for this company across the board. I think, again, across the board, actually, I think this company does spectacular marketing. Whatever we did last year, we got to do better this year. Whatever we do this year, we got to do better next year. We demand it of ourselves, and frankly, the market demands it of us.
Mike Hickey
Nice. On AI, Strauss, not to be redundant, you gave a really thorough answer, but maybe just for clarification, do you feel like at this point you've got broad buy-in from your studio leadership around the use of AI tools, not just in marketing, but in game development? When you think about these tools over time, I know you're doing a lot in terms of investing in product tools related to AI. Do you think this will allow you and your studio teams to unlock maybe some dormant franchise IP or even new IP that may not have been produced over the last decade plus due to resource constraints? If that's the case, would you look to build headcount into that opportunity? Thank you.
Strauss Zelnick
I think that everyone has bought into the possibilities of new technology. I think there are times when some of my colleagues think I'm too conservative on the topic. I've actually never been accused internally of going too fast or doing crazy stuff. I think I probably err on the side of being a little more conservative. Think about it. The people who are on the front lines of developing here are absolute experts in software, in art, and in video games. The way they got the job to work at a company like this is because they were on the front lines, and because they were innovating, and they were highly creative, and because they were efficient. You have to assume that they're going to be the first people to embrace new technology that allows them to do a better job.
Strauss Zelnick
That said, we're known for making these beautiful handcrafted titles around here. Any technology that we use, I think, will be in the hands of immensely creative people and will take the form of handcrafting. Our art is created in computers. It always has been. Our art is created by human beings using computers, and I believe that will continue to be the case.
Mike Hickey
Thanks, guys.
Operator
Your next question comes from the line of Brian Pitz with BMO Capital Markets. Please go ahead.
Brian Pitz
Thanks for the questions. I'll try a couple here. Any additional color you can provide on GTA VI around your framework for the PC release, as well as if the game has any chance of being cross-platform? Also, any best estimates on when we could see a pre-sale launch for the game? If not, perhaps you could at least provide your best guesstimate of timing on hearing more of these details. Thanks.
Strauss Zelnick
As you know, look, the PC market is a great market, and it is growing for console-type titles, and it is a market we serve avidly. Virtually all of our hit titles end up on all platforms over time. That said, Rockstar Games has announced GTA VI for console only so far. We are excited about our November 19th release.
Brian Pitz
Thank you.
Operator
Your next question comes from the line of Ron Song with Wolfe Research. Please go ahead.
Ron Song
Hey, guys. Thanks for the question. Turning back to NBA. I know Lainie talked about the fourth quarter, but as we look at fiscal 2027 and lapping that 30% RCS growth, I guess, is there anything you can share or break down on what gives you the line of sight to being able to sustain the high single-digits? I guess I'm really trying to get at how you think about the stage of growth for monetization and engagement for the basketball franchise, noting what Karl said about the [stay chain] comment. Thanks.
Lainie Goldstein
We're incredibly proud of NBA 2K's fiscal 2026 record-breaking results, and we're applying the successful learnings to our strategy for this year, including within NBA 2K27. While fiscal 2026 set records, we have a consistent track record of delivering strong, sustainable RCS growth and are confident in doing so in fiscal 2027. When VC looks at the game each year, they just do not rest on their laurels. They continue to make this game bigger and better every year, and we've seen that time and time again.
Operator
Your next question comes from the line of Martin Yang with Oppenheimer. Please go ahead.
Martin Yang
Hi. Thank you for taking the question. I have one question on mobile.
Karl Slatoff
Obviously, we've had a lot of great success in the Turkish market from a development perspective. Some of our biggest and best titles in our studios are in Turkey. We have a fantastic relationship with our developers there, and we love being in that environment. In terms of the government opportunities, to the extent that there are opportunities available in any jurisdiction where we operate, we would take advantage of those as much as we possibly can. Local jurisdictions are very important business partners to us, and it's something that we take very seriously because it's an opportunity. It's not only good for us, but it's also good for the local markets.
Martin Yang
Thanks, Karl.
Operator
Your next question comes from the line of Omar Dessouky with Bank of America. Please go ahead.
Omar Dessouky
Hey. Thanks for taking my question. Strauss, I was in the audience at a conference you spoke at recently, and you made two comments that really caught my attention. One comment was that you'd price your games to reflect the value that they provide for consumers. A second comment was that the retail price of video games has gone down in real terms over the years. Do your comments imply that you also believe a $70 price tag would be too low for GTA VI relative to its value to consumers? By that logic, a $70 price tag implies to me that the consumer value of GTA VI will also go down.
Omar Dessouky
If I've misheard your comments, I apologize. If my logic is flawed, what would a $70 price tag imply about the consumer value of GTA VI relative to its predecessor?
Strauss Zelnick
I think what I was trying to get at was on real terms, video games have become a better and better deal for consumers over a period of time, and that that's a good thing. I don't think the comments are in conflict. In other words, if you can give people something really great and you can offer it on really favorable economic terms, that's a win-win. I was really trying to make the point that even though I think the value has grown materially, certainly a video game released today is vastly more exciting, compelling, intriguing, and longer-lasting entertainment than it was when I was at Crystal Dynamics in 1993. In real terms, front-line prices have declined. I was using that as a backdrop to point out that we think that the most important thing is to deliver the best entertainment on earth.
Strauss Zelnick
The second most important thing is to do it on really favorable economic terms. I didn't mean to guide in any way how you should think about our upcoming unannounced price on any release. That'll become clear to the market in the fullness of time. Whatever it is, though, we want it to represent enormous value to the consumer.
Omar Dessouky
Okay. Thanks a lot.
Operator
Your next question comes from the line of Clay Griffin with MoffettNathanson LLC. Please go ahead.
Clay Griffin
Thanks. Good afternoon. You all had such success with, I think you coined the phrase actually, tethered free-to-play with GTA Online. It helped you sell full game units, and full game unit sales helped onboard people onto GTA Online. I know the industry has changed a lot over the years, and you haven't announced any pricing or packaging as it relates to this topic, but just curious if there are dynamics or evolutions in the industry that would make that decision different than the decision you so successfully used with GTA V and GTA Online, the tethered free-to-play strategy.
Strauss Zelnick
I think, of course, not having announced any online version for GTA VI, it certainly would be premature to talk about an upcoming business model for something that we haven't talked about. I think conceptually, what we pride ourselves on here is being thoughtful and open-minded, and trying to meet consumers where they are, and trying to optimize the entertainment or experience for those consumers. That's where we've been talking about a lot on this call. When it really comes down to it, what does this company think about? 24/7, what do I think about? I think about making sure that this is an enterprise that more so than any other entertainment enterprise on earth, focuses on making hit properties that excite and engage consumers. That's what we all think about. Right now, I'm in a room with our staff, right?
Strauss Zelnick
In this room, we're staff executives, right? The IR team, the finance team, the operations team, legal team. Our job, we don't make the titles here. We don't market them, not in this room, not the room that's talking to you today. Our mission is to make great entertainment properties. If we get that right as an organization, all 14,000 people, full-time colleagues and contractors associated with Take-Two and our affiliates focus on making the best entertainment on earth, everything else will take care of itself. Naturally, we have to be the most thoughtful people, the most aggressive people with regard to marketing and distribution. Oh, by the way, legal activities, finance activities, accounting activities, tax activities as well. That's our job. The mission of the organization is to make great entertainment.
Strauss Zelnick
Having spent a long time in every entertainment business there is, I can tell you one thing, hits cure all ills. Make great hits over and over and over again, you're going to have a great enterprise. We're so proud of everything this company does, and we're so proud of the culture in which we do it. If we don't get up every day and make hits, none of that matters. That's our job. That's what we focus on. Frankly, the results that we're talking about today and the guidance that we gave you for tomorrow, all of that is based on having made hits, having delivered hits, and an expectation that we are going to blast through, and an expectation that we're going to continue doing just that at a higher and higher level.
Clay Griffin
Thank you. Peace out.
Operator
Your next question comes from the line of Drew Crum, B. Riley Securities. Please go ahead.
Drew Crum
Okay, thanks. Hey, guys. Good afternoon. Looking at your Net Bookings guidance, how, if in any way, is potential cannibalization from GTA VI influencing your view or range of outcomes you see for fiscal 2027? Thanks.
Strauss Zelnick
Look, cannibalization doesn't really apply to the entertainment business. In the entertainment business, you compete against everything. You compete against your competitors, you compete against yourselves. You compete against nothing, the choice to do nothing. If you're in the grocery business, everyone needs to eat, so you're competing with the grocery store next door. With regard to entertainment, if there's something that you want in the market and then there's something else that you want, you'll try to buy both. If there's nothing that you want, you won't buy either. There's no one-to-one cannibalization. In fact, history shows that when there's a big hit in the market, you know what it does? It energizes consumers around the entertainment market, and they consume more.
Strauss Zelnick
I actually think if we're fortunate enough to have the kind of year that we expect, maybe we'll even do a little better than we expect, that's not just going to be good for Take-Two and our labels, it's going to be good for the industry as a whole.
Drew Crum
Thanks, Strauss.
Operator
That concludes our question-and-answer session. I will now turn the call back to Strauss
Strauss Zelnick
I've spoken an awful lot today, and as you pointed out, I've been in a bunch of conferences lately too, so maybe no one needs to hear any more from me. I would like to say this, though. We delivered great results that we talked about today, and we set a guidance that reflects great results going forward. All of that comes from our colleagues around the world. I want to take a minute to express this management team's enormous gratitude and my personal gratitude to our creative teams, our marketing teams, and our distribution teams, and our finance teams and our operations teams all over the world, more than 100 offices around the world, if I'm not mistaken, who work incredibly hard in an incredibly dedicated way to support our collective mission. All of this is because of their work.
Strauss Zelnick
I just get to organize the victory lap. Thank you to our team. I'd like to take a moment also to thank our shareholders and everyone who supports us and the people who attended this call. It's always nice to have a good news call, and we're really happy to share it with you all.
Transcript from May 21, 2026
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