Watching stocks over the short-term is often an experiment in futility; on July 9th 2016 we looked back at the state of Games Workshop’s stock price and general financial health…

This is a often an interesting time for stocks, as we end the 3rd quarter investors get ready to make bets on how the rest of the year is going to go. Usually volatility is calm in September, as even investors have to deal with things like kids going back to school. September didn’t see any major global events to really mess with the financial markets either, but overall most exchanges are slightly down from a good August. Sometimes GW is immune to these minor fluctuations, but let us look at the past month and see what happened.

To see what I am talking about, lets take a look at Games Workshop stock for just September 2016

After months of positive price movement GW has fallen back a bit, to the tune of just over 5% This isn’t good news, but there is a reason, as you will see at the end of the article. In the meantime, how does this make the year look to date?

Having worked to being “only” down 14% off from last year, GW is now back down over 18% for the year! The reason for the drop off seems to be timed with a stock purchase by Aberforth Partners LLP. This is strange, but what is missing is the other real big news from last month, the ending of GW licensing agreement with Fantasy Flight.

https://www.fantasyflightgames.com/en/news/2016/9/9/a-new-path-forward/

As anyone who reads these reports, knows most of GW profits for the last 5 years or so have been tied to the licensing agreements with third parties. We don’t know who is responsible for the break up, but what we do know is Fantasy Flight union with European game maker Asmodee probably had something to do with it. Not to mention, the highly profitable Star Wars license Fantasy Flight is totally devoted to.

October usually has big swings in stocks and especially with the American Presidential election on the horizon. We shall see if anything changes for the fortunes Games Workshop.