Games Workshop share price: A game worth playing?

[GeorgeIG]

Games Workshop Group (GAW) has experienced incredible growth over the last few years. The share price for the wargame manufacturer rose by 101.5% in 2019.

Games Workshop is a constituent of the FTSE 250, where it ranked fifth highest in terms of contribution to the index’s total return in 2019. You’d be wrong to think this was a one-off. In 2018 the company came in at eighth and was the second highest performer in the FTSE All-Share Index in 2017, generating a total return of 267.17%, beaten only by KAZ Minerals (KAZ).

To illustrate the company’s extraordinary growth, look no further than the chart below.

Figure 1: Games Workshop (GAW) market cap and share price

Source: Bloomberg, January 2020

The meteoric rise in Games Workshop has coincided with growth in the gaming industry, which has been well documented over the last decade. We have seen Fortnite, a free-to-play online video game, post record sales of $1.8 billion in 2019 – the highest of any game in history.1 Record viewership numbers have followed, with 3.9 million peak viewers tuning into a League of Legends World Championship semi-final, 94% higher than last year’s tournament.2 Millennials really do love gaming.

Whilst most of the growth in the gaming industry is attributed to online video games, the board gaming scene has experienced a recent resurgence and growth is expected to continue in the coming years.

Arizton, an advisory and research firm, predicts the board games market will grow to £12 billion by 2023, from around £8 billion today.3 The market is forecasted to grow by +8% per year due to the growing audience of gamers and a trickle-down effect to sub-sectors such as board games. Also, as Games Workshop point out, people enjoy the social side of gaming together in-person, as opposed to playing behind a screen.

You can invest in Games Workshop Group with IG from as little as £5 on the IG share dealing platform.

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Solving the puzzle: what does the company do?

Games Workshop is the largest hobby miniatures company in the world and was founded over 30 years ago. Its most successful brand is the iconic Warhammer product and it also holds the license for The Lord of the Rings Battle board game. With over 400 retail stores globally, it is a truly vertically integrated business as it controls the design, manufacturing and distribution of its product range. Although, the company is keen to outline that it is a manufacturer, not a retailer, with retail stores being used to engage with customers and introduce them to the hobby of painting, collecting and playing with the fantasy miniatures.

Rachel Tongue, finance director at Games Workshop, has a tight grip on the financial health of the company. The group’s policy is to pay dividends entirely out of any ‘truly surplus cash’, not out of debt – which should be music to the ears of long-term shareholders. Moreover, the company has had no outstanding long or short-term debt since 2010. Lastly, to further demonstrate this, take a look at the below snippet from the company’s investor relations website:

Quote

'We don’t spend money on things we don’t need, like expensive offices or prime rent shopping locations or advertising that speaks to the mass market and not our small band of loyal followers. We only invest where it makes a positive improvement to our business model.'

Guess Who: Games Workshop shareholders

Institutional investors account for the majority of Games Workshop’s shareholders with investment advisory firms holding 74%, based on publicly reported data. A new addition to this list is Schroders who disclosed on 11 December 2019 that they had purchased 5.6% of the 32.7 million shares outstanding in Games Workshop.

Interestingly, the former chairman of the group, Thomas Kirby, still owns 4% of the company. On 27 September 2018, Kirby spooked shareholders by issuing the sale of £20.3 million worth of Games Workshop shares – causing the share price to fall by 4.2% the following day. After the sale, Kirby was subject to a 180-day lockup period for his remaining holdings, which has now expired meaning we may see a reoccurrence sometime this year.

Figure 2: Top 10 investors in Games Workshop shares

Shareholders	Shares owned as % of total outstanding	Type of investor
1. JPMorgan Chase & Co	9.14%	Investment Advisor
2. Schroders PLC	5.58%	Investment Advisor
3. Standard Life Aberdeen PLC	5.54%	Investment Advisor
4. BlackRock Inc	5.44%	Investment Advisor
5. Vanguard Group Inc/The	4.05%	Investment Advisor
6. Castlefield Investment Partners LL	3.97%	Investment Advisor
7. Kirby Thomas H F	3.96%	Former GAW Chairman
8. Soros Fund Management LLC	2.71%	Hedge Fund
9. Dimensional Fund Advisors LP	2.60%	Investment Advisor
10. Credit Suisse Group AG	2.59%	Investment Advisor

Source: Bloomberg, January 2020

The (Trivial) Pursuit of returns: what does 2020 have instore for Games Workshop?

Edison Investment Research, the primary broker for Games Workshop, is one of only two firms who do so, with the other being Peel Hunt. Both will be keeping a close eye on the half-year results which will be published on 14 January 2020.

The consensus amongst analysts, albeit an extremely small sample size, is that the upcoming year will be another positive one for the group. In its most recent research report posted at the start of November, Edison revised its share price valuation upwards by 10% to £51.76 after a strong five-month trading statement. Since then, the share price has exceeded Edison’s target price by 20.5% (as of 7 January).

Looking at the previous four years, revenue and net income and have grown by a compound annual growth rate of 21.4% and 47.7%, respectively. In what will be an interesting next couple of years for the company, Kate Heseltine, an analyst at Edison, projects growth to continue into 2020 and in the following year, as indicated in the below graph.

Figure 3: Games Workshop Net Income and Revenue (History & Forecasts)

Source: Bloomberg, January, data from 2020 and 2021 are estimates

1. SuperData

2. Esports Charts

3. Arizton

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[dmedin]

Yes, I remember them from my childhood days.  They charged extortionate prices on their little metal figures, their magazines and range of paints.  And they changed the rules and figure sets all the time forcing people to buy new stuff.  Now I think they get most of their money from licensing their IP to video games.  They have always been extremely tight-assed, penny-pinching and mean - not surprised that they are very profitable!

[phillo]

[dmedin]

10 hours ago, elle said:

 

🤔

 

All of the FTSE 250 stocks have stupid spreads in the SB/CFD platform.  I guess the only way is to buy the shares for real.

[dmedin]

The horse has already bolted.  I think you'd be bonkers to buy at this price😵

[GeorgeIG]

On 10/01/2020 at 16:18, dmedin said:

Yes, I remember them from my childhood days.  They charged extortionate prices on their little metal figures, their magazines and range of paints.  And they changed the rules and figure sets all the time forcing people to buy new stuff.  Now I think they get most of their money from licensing their IP to video games.  They have always been extremely tight-assed, penny-pinching and mean - not surprised that they are very profitable!

They do make a fair chunk of their operating profit through royalties, but the majority still comes from online/trade sales. Although, royalties is definitely a segment that is growing for them (something they are proud of). It accounted for £6.9m of operating profit in 2017, up to £10.4m now.

[GeorgeIG]

On 13/01/2020 at 04:14, dmedin said:

The horse has already bolted.  I think you'd be bonkers to buy at this price😵

GAW announced record breaking half-year results this morning, here is a few key points:

• Big jump in profits to £58.6m up from £40.8m
• Revenue £145.6m, £125.2m previously
• Royalties receivable up to £10.7m for the half year, a 94.5% increase from the same period last year.

Share price up around 7% since open (at the time of posting).

 

[dmedin]

Nothing disheartens me more than seeing a chart of a stock that's already taken off.  I still wouldn't buy at this point.

 

[dmedin]

Let's see a pullback to here before we get nice and long, eh Tabitha?

[GeorgeIG]

19 hours ago, dmedin said:

Let's see a pullback to here before we get nice and long, eh Tabitha?

Fallen around 2.8% today, down to 6772.5 now.

[phillo]

trend line retested

[dmedin]

There's a 60 point spread on this stock (so you're paying IG £60 just to trade it), so it's out of the question to SB/CFD on it.  It's also a really expensive stock to buy, £75 for one share?  Wow.  At least it pays a dividend of 40p per share hahahaha

Edited January 16, 2020 by dmedin

[dmedin]

I beg your pardon, the spread is only 34 points now

 

[dmedin]

So it did break out of an unsustainable degree of trend but it's still definitely up, now the question is can we get a much better price to buy into?

Edited January 30, 2020 by dmedin

[dmedin]

Might not get a chance to buy in yet.

[dmedin]

Same thing happened to me with JD Sports.  You think it's too good to be true, and you are afraid of buying at the top, but the price just keeps rising and rising.  It's too expensive anyway.

 

Edited February 6, 2020 by dmedin

[dmedin]

Price is coming back down to earth.  😄

[dmedin]

Still going strong I would have a punt if the spread wasn't so cavernous

[dmedin]

£62, a spread worth paying?

[kosai1111]

Nice information, where from do you take it?

[dmedin]

18 minutes ago, kosai1111 said:

where from do you take it?

That's a very personal question

[dmedin]

Does the virus mean grown men will have more time to sit in doors and paint their little figurines?

[dmedin]

Such a shame IG's spread is so f*king appalling otherwise it would be worth going long.

[dmedin]

What's that you say, Peregrin Took?

One ought to have gone long on 8 April?  Ah you might be right!

[dmedin]

Games Workshop's 'moat' - charging a fortune for little plastic men

 

 

[dmedin]

On 08/04/2020 at 16:35, dmedin said:

Such a shame IG's spread is so f*king appalling otherwise it would be worth going long.

 

Ah yes, the state of that chart is a reflection of the state of my mind at the time - all over the f*king place

[caselounsbery]

Hello, this is a great informational article.