When Niantic sold Pokémon GO in May 2025, Nintendo turned out to have been sitting on one of its best investments. A private stake that had cost it ¥1.16bn, which we identify as its Niantic shares, sold for ¥33.8bn, 29 times what it paid. The Pokémon Company booked a one-off gain of ¥23.8bn in the same year and has never said where it came from. We think it is about two to one that it was mainly the same sale.
Nintendo turned about a billion yen into more than thirty
In October 2015, nine months before Pokémon GO came out, the Pokémon side, Google and Nintendo put money into Niantic, the Google spin-out building it. On 29 May 2025 Scopely closed its purchase of Niantic’s games business. Nintendo’s accounts for the year to March 2026 show one unlisted shareholding sold for ¥33.8bn and a gain on investment securities of ¥32.7bn, almost all of it booked in April–June 2025, the quarter of the closing. The difference is the cost, and part of it was paid before April 2019, because Nintendo’s later purchases of private shares do not add up to it.
In dollars Nintendo received about $235m, or 6.1% of the $3.85bn that Niantic said its shareholders would get. Fig. 1 sets cost against sale.
Nintendo sold a private-company stake for ¥33.8bn that had cost it about ¥1.2bn
Book cost of the stake and its sale price in the year to March 2026, ¥ billion, from Nintendo’s securities reports.
- Cost, estimate
- Sale price
Show the numbers
| Year | Cost, estimate, ¥bn | Sale price, ¥bn | Source |
|---|---|---|---|
| What the stake cost Nintendo | – | ||
| What it sold for, year to March 2026 | – |
Cost, estimate. Our estimate of the sold stake’s book cost. None of the later purchases add up to it, so at least part was paid before April 2019.
Sale price. Filed by Nintendo; its gain on investment securities that year was ¥32.7bn. About 29 times the cost.
One stake left Nintendo’s list that year
Japanese companies report each year how many unlisted shareholdings they hold and which ones grew or shrank. Nintendo held 17 in March 2025 and 16 a year later, with none added and one reduced. A count that falls by exactly one means the whole holding went. It also means Nintendo took no shares in Niantic Spatial, the mapping company spun out of the deal, although Niantic had said that “original investors will also continue to be shareholders of Niantic Spatial”. Fig. 2 shows the list’s book value by year.
The book value of Nintendo’s private-company stakes fell from ¥7.4bn to ¥6.0bn when one of the 17 was sold
Book value of Nintendo’s unlisted shareholdings, ¥ billion, at March 2020 to March 2026. The count went from 17 to 16 in the last year.
Show the numbers
| Year | Book value of Nintendo’s private-company stakes, ¥bn | Source |
|---|---|---|
| 2020 | ||
| 2021 | ||
| 2022 | ||
| 2023 | ||
| 2024 | ||
| 2025 | ||
| 2026 |
Book value of Nintendo’s private-company stakes. Stakes held for business ties, from Nintendo’s annual securities reports. 16 stakes to 2022, 17 for 2023–25 (one bought each in 2023 and 2024, one written off at nil in 2024), 16 in 2026 after one was sold for ¥33.8bn.
The Pokémon Company booked a gain three-quarters the size
TPC’s Tokyo company reported a net one-off gain of ¥23.8bn for the year from March 2025 to February 2026, a period that contains the closing. Its next largest in six years of accounts was ¥1.1bn. The gain was taxed at about the normal rate, which fits a taxable sale of shares.
The size needs explaining, because TPC’s gain is 0.73 times Nintendo’s. Niantic’s 2015 filing in the United States records $20m and one dollar sold to 4 investors, a sum that divides into three equal parts. Niantic’s Japanese announcement names the Tokyo company and its American arm together as the Pokémon group. One Pokémon ticket split between two companies fits both documents. On that reading the Tokyo company held 73% of the ticket and received ¥24.6–25.0bn, which is 4.4–4.5% of the payout to Nintendo’s 6.1%, and a further ≈¥8.9bn of gain sits in the American arm, outside the Tokyo accounts.
That is a judgement. We give 0.68 to the gain being mainly the Tokyo company’s Niantic sale, and within that about half to the split ticket. Fig. 3 shows the gain against TPC’s earlier years.
The Pokémon Company’s ¥23.8bn one-off gain in the year to February 2026 was 22 times its next largest
Net one-off gains and losses of The Pokémon Company’s Tokyo parent, ¥ billion, years to February 2021 to 2026.
- Net loss
Show the numbers
| Year to February | The Pokémon Company, net one-off gains and losses, ¥bn | Source |
|---|---|---|
| 2021 | ||
| 2022 | ||
| 2023 | ||
| 2024 | ||
| 2025 | ||
| 2026 |
The Pokémon Company, net one-off gains and losses. Parent company only, years to February. 2026 is net of any one-off losses, so the gross gain could be larger; it is 22 times the previous high (2023).