[THE INVESTOR] Earnings of Korean game giants -- Nexon Korea and NCsoft -- took a breather in the second half of this year following stellar performances in the previous quarter, but Netmarble Games pulled off a turnaround, industry sources said on July 10.

Korea’s top game publisher, Nexon Korea, is estimated to have posted an operating income in the 100 billion won (US$90 million) range during April-June period with its sales reaching the upper end of the 400-billion-won band.

The company chalked up an operating income of 165.3 billion won on sales of 477.8 billion won a year earlier.

But the numbers are far lower than the previous quarter. In the fourth quarter of last year, Nexon Korea registered a record quarterly operating profit of 541.3 billion won with its top line grazing a new high of 895.3 billion won.

A company official attributed the on-quarter drop to a seasonal factor.

Rival NCSoft is expected to see its second-quarter performance improve sharply from a year earlier, but fare worse than three months earlier.

Analysts forecast NCSOFT‘s second-quarter operating profit to surge 300 percent on-year to nearly 100 billion won, with sales spiking 70 percent to about 400 billion won. In the previous quarter, NCsoft recorded an operating income of 203.9 billion won on sales of 475.2 billion won.

Korea’s top mobile game developer Netmarble Games is forecast to have posted a turnaround in the second quarter of the year after a poor showing three months earlier.

Netmarble’s second-quarter operating income is estimated at 90 billion won on sales of 570 billion won, compared with 74.2 billion won and 507.4 billion won, respectively, in the first quarter.

By Song Seung-hyun and newswires (ssh@heraldcorp.com)