NHN and Neowiz to Benefit from Deregulation
The author is an analyst of NH Investment & Securities. He can be reached at jaemin.ahn@nhqv.com. -- Ed.
After four years of enforcement, regulations on web-board games are finally set to be eased, a development which should benefit both NHN and Neowiz. Increasing consumption of game content due to Covid-19 is also positive. We expect significant growth in the web-board game industry in 2020.
NHN and Neowiz to benefit from deregulation
Having been passed by the National Assembly, a partial revision of an act on the promotion of the game industry is to be implemented from Apr 7. In particular, the abolishment of the W100,000 daily maximum loss regulation warrants attention, as it should benefit NHN and Neowiz’s web-board game businesses.
We note that the daily loss limit is to be removed as it overlaps with a monthly spending limit of W500,000 and betting limit per turn of W50,000. We expect the change to boost earnings at web-board game companies.
Web-board game industry: Significant growth expected in 2020
We expect the web-board game industry to display substantial growth in 2020.
1) Following Apple’s adoption of an age verification system last August, web-board games have been released on the App Store, and their sales rankings are showing consistent improvement.
2) Sales growth is expected from the upcoming deregulation.
3) Game sales are rising as people spend more time indoors due to Covid-19. Specifically, we expect to see a hike in content and item consumption, as well as more time spent playing games. Web-board game sales should stand out as the average age of players is higher than that for other genres.
ecommend pure web-board game play Neowiz
While web-board game deregulation promises to benefit both NHN and Neowiz, we recommend focusing attention on pure web-board player Neowiz.
In detail, we expect the company to enjoy a web-board games sales hike in addition to growing expectations for various other new games, including titles based on Bless IP and Skul.