19-04-2005 05:54									#1
	GameStop to Acquire Electronics Boutique Support Apolyton, buy Call to Power 2

http://www.nytimes.com/aponline/bus...-Boutique.html?

quote: GameStop to Acquire Electronics Boutique By THE ASSOCIATED PRESS Published: April 18, 2005 Filed at 11:50 a.m. ET DALLAS (AP) -- Video-game retailer GameStop Corp. has agreed to buy rival Electronics Boutique Holdings Corp. for about $1.4 billion in cash and stock, creating a chain of about 3,800 stores worldwide. The sale price reflects a 34 percent premium over Electronics Boutique's closing stock price on Friday. Shares of Electronics Boutique rose even higher -- up $14.42 or 35.1 percent, to $55.54 -- in trading Monday morning on the Nasdaq Stock Market. GameStop shares rose $2.15 or 10 percent, to $23.76 on the New York Stock Exchange. The deal would combine two companies of similar size and sales. Grapevine-based GameStop operates about 1,800 stores and had revenue of $1.84 billion in its last fiscal year. Electronics Boutique, based in West Chester, Pa., runs about 2,000 stores and had sales last year of $1.99 billion. The companies compete against big general retailers such as Wal-Mart Stores Inc. Movie-rental chain Blockbuster Inc. is also seeking more of the game market. GameStop said the deal would add ''significantly'' to earnings per share in the second half of this year and coming years. It said the combination would create cost savings beginning in fiscal 2006, which begins next February. The boards of each company unanimously approved the deal, which is subject to approval by antitrust regulators and shareholders of both companies. Electronics Boutique founder and Chairman James Kim, who controls about 47 percent of its voting shares, and Leonard Riggio, who owns about 16 percent of GameStop's voting stock, have each agreed to vote their shares for the sale, the companies said. Shareholders of Electronics Boutique would get $38.15 in cash plus 0.78795 shares of GameStop common stock for each share of Electronics Boutique. Based on Friday's closing prices, GameStop would pay $55.18 in cash and stock for each Electronics Boutique share. GameStop said it would issue about $950 million in bonds to finance the deal. GameStop chairman and chief executive R. Richard Fontaine said the acquisition would let his company enter new international markets and compete better in the hard-fought U.S. video-game business. He said GameStop planned to continue its aggressive store growth plans. The combined company will have annual revenue of about $3.8 billion and more than 3,200 U.S. stores and nearly 600 stores in Canada, Europe, Australia and New Zealand. GameStop said Fontaine would remain chairman and CEO and Daniel A. DeMatteo, vice chairman and chief operating officer, will stay in those jobs.

So even fewer choices at the local malls for games. Not that either of these stores are worth going to in lieu of Fry's or even BestBuy. At least it gives me something to do while the wife is trying on clothing.

anyway to the decreased shelfspace given to pc games in theses places.

	19-04-2005 05:57									#2
	Avatar Enlargement: We've got the solution

Both Game Stop and EB have inflated prices. If you must shop local then Fry's is cheapest and discounts the fastest (Walmart isn't bad for well known titles but they often censor games so I avoid Walmart), however, the net offers the lowest prices you can find any where. Most places can even get it to you in 1-3 days.

	19-04-2005 06:29									#3
	Tired of ads?

All those places have fewer and fewer PC titles anyways.

I went to an EB todau and they had 20 titles tops. Most over a year old.

100s of PS2 and Xbox titles though.

	19-04-2005 06:39									#4
	Support Apolyton, buy Call to Power 2

Those have a higher profit margin and less competition plus the little runts buy more games then us old timers.

	19-04-2005 07:53									#5
	Remove this text

Gamestops in my area tend to have a large selection of bargin bin games. Something a place like Bestbuy and Walmart just simply doesn't have.

	19-04-2005 08:17									#6
	Support Apolyton buy from Amazon

So... the smaller company is buying out the bigger one, eh? Okay.

	19-04-2005 08:36									#7
	Support Apolyton

quote: Originally posted by Oerdin Both Game Stop and EB have inflated prices. If you must shop local then Fry's is cheapest and discounts the fastest (Walmart isn't bad for well known titles but they often censor games so I avoid Walmart), however, the net offers the lowest prices you can find any where. Most places can even get it to you in 1-3 days.

Any recommendations where on the net?

	19-04-2005 08:41									#8
	Avatar Enlargement: We've got the solution

It does as though both have just moved away from computer gaming and so aren't as offering as many games.

	19-04-2005 08:43									#9
	Inflate your Upload Space

quote: Originally posted by St Leo So... the smaller company is buying out the bigger one, eh? Okay.

Or the larger company is selling out to the smaller, which makes this more understandable. Looks like the founder of EB wants out, wants diversification for his personal portfolio. Given the vaugaries of market psychology he can't just go dump a lot of stock so he is pretty much forced into the option of selling or merging his company.

$38.15/share, eh? Given these numbers and the article, Kim owns about 11,500,000 shares of EB, which means he'll clear a half-billion in cold hard cash. He'll still have 9,000,000 shares left (valued at $43), which gives him a $387,000,000 sized stake in the combined company. He also is in control of a semiconductor company, Amkor Technology Inc.

	19-04-2005 09:29									#10
	Support Apolyton, buy Civilization 2

quote: Originally posted by Barinthus Any recommendations where on the net?

http://www.bizrate.com/

That's a meta shopping site which automatically surfs dozens of other top online retailers then shows you the lowest prices. They have mostly console cames though.

Amazon is always good as is ebay. Fry's website also has a killer selection at rock bottom prices. I've heard good things about pricegrabber.com but I've never used them.

	19-04-2005 09:35									#11
	Support Apolyton or Terrorists Win

http://shopper.cnet.com/PC/2001-9696_9-0.html?tag=dir

c/net shopper seems to have a wide selection and it automatically checks the prices at dozens of websites then give you all of the prices with shipping included so you can easily compare.

	19-04-2005 10:30									#12
	Put an end to popups!

I remember when Gamestop was FunCo...bastards gave me about 15 bucks for 12 SNES games back when SNES was still cool...

	19-04-2005 10:33									#13
	Full PM-box? Change here!

I never even heard of them until a few yours ago. When I was a kid you went to Toy R Us, Electronic Boutique, or KB Toys to buy Nintendo games. KB used to be the bomb ass place to pick up Atari games to back when those were cool.

	19-04-2005 17:25									#14
	Support Apolyton, pre-order Civilization IV

Didnt' one of these companies purchase babbages in the 90's?

	19-04-2005 17:28									#15
	Support Apolyton buy from Amazon

Thanks, Oerdin.

I wonder if I'm better off ordering from Fry's website instead of going to one of their stores?

	19-04-2005 17:28									#16
	Support Apolyton buy from Amazon

quote: Originally posted by Oerdin I never even heard of them until a few yours ago. When I was a kid you went to Toy R Us, Electronic Boutique, or KB Toys to buy Nintendo games. KB used to be the bomb ass place to pick up Atari games to back when those were cool.

Yeah, EB was my place of choice back then.

	19-04-2005 23:53									#17
	Enter the AD-FREE zone

quote: Originally posted by Oerdin Both Game Stop and EB have inflated prices. If you must shop local then Fry's is cheapest and discounts the fastest (Walmart isn't bad for well known titles but they often censor games so I avoid Walmart), however, the net offers the lowest prices you can find any where. Most places can even get it to you in 1-3 days.

are you sure walmart censors games?

yes I know they censor music cd's. But I doubt they have computer programmers smart enough to alter code in a computer program.

	19-04-2005 23:56									#18
	Increase Your PM Length

In other news, Adobe has bought Macromedia.

	20-04-2005 09:30									#19
	Lose 30 kilos (of popups)

Right here, Vesayen...

	20-04-2005 09:42									#20
	Support Apolyton, buy Civilization 2

I worked at a gamestop... I still buy my games at EB lol.

This makes me sad. Both companies have gone too far from their origins, selling PC games but EB still has more variety and and bargain bins for PC games.

quote: Originally posted by asleepathewheel Didnt' one of these companies purchase babbages in the 90's?

EB bought babages.

	20-04-2005 09:49									#21
	Got spare money?

quote: Originally posted by Vesayen I worked at a gamestop... I still buy my games at EB lol. This makes me sad. Both companies have gone too far from their origins, selling PC games but EB still has more variety and and bargain bins for PC games. EB bought babages.

Must be why all the Babbage's in Utah closed, they had no EB.

The EB here has no bargain bin.

ACK!

	20-04-2005 11:30									#22
	Support Apolyton, buy Alpha Centauri

quote: Originally posted by Q Cubed In other news, Adobe has bought Macromedia.

Isn't Adobe bigger than Macromedia?

If not, it goes to show you how many idiots there are out there.