Nintendo, the Japanese video game maker behind the Super Mario and Pokemon franchises, is reporting an 18.6% surge in net profit for the first fiscal quarter on the back of strong demand for its new Switch 2 console

TOKYO — Nintendo, the Japanese video game maker behind the Super Mario and Pokemon franchises, reported an 18.6% surge in net profit for the first fiscal quarter Friday on the back of strong demand for its new Switch 2 console.

Kyoto-based Nintendo Co.’s April-June profit totaled 96.03 billion yen ($640 million), up from nearly 81 billion yen. Quarterly sales more than doubled to 572.36 billion yen ($3.8 billion).

Nintendo said it sold 3.5 million Switch 2 game consoles globally on the first four days after it hit store shelves June 5, a record pace for a Nintendo game machine. Its sales continue to be strong, it said.

The company said the new console’s higher price added to sales growth momentum. The new version sells for about $450 compared to $300 for the previous Switch when it first went on sale in 2017, .

Especially popular games included “Mario Kart World” and “Donkey Kong Bananza.” “Pokemon Friends,” which went on sale last month for the older Switch, can be also played on the new Switch.

The Switch works both as a handheld portable machine and as a home console.

Nintendo stuck to its forecast to sell 15 million Switch 2 machines through this fiscal year.

Nintendo left unchanged its profit forecast for the year through March 2026, at 300 billion yen ($2 billion) profit, up nearly 8% on year.

Nintendo stock, which has steadily climbed in the past year gaining more than 50%, edged down nearly 1% before earnings were announced.

There are some worries about the impact of President Donald Trump’s tariffs on Japanese exports, but that did not appear to affect Nintendo’s overall projections.

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Yuri Kageyama is on Threads: https://www.threads.com/@yurikageyama

TOKYO — Japanese technology and entertainment company Sony logged an 18% rise in profit for the fiscal year through March on healthy results at its music and video-game operations.

Tokyo-based Sony Corp. said Wednesday that its annual profit totaled 1.14 trillion yen ($7.8 billion), up from 970.6 billion yen in the previous fiscal year.

Annual sales were virtually unchanged, inching down to 12.957 trillion yen ($88 billion) from 13.020 trillion yen.

One area that lagged among Sony’s sprawling businesses was the financial segment, where revenue stalled. But its film division and its imaging and sensor solutions segment did well.

Among the movies that fared positively at the box office for the fiscal year through March were “Venom: The Last Dance,” featuring the Marvel Comics superhero, and “Bad Boys: Ride or Die,” an action comedy, in which Will Smith and Martin Lawrence come back in their popular cop roles, the fourth installment in the series.

Sony, which makes the PlayStation console and game software played on that machine, also marked healthy results in the gaming business.

Its music operations, which also held up, include recordings, streaming services and music for games. The top-selling recorded music projects for the latest fiscal year globally was SZA’s “SOS Deluxe: LANA,” followed by Beyonce, Future & Metro Boomin and Travis Scott.

For the Japan music business, the top-seller was Kenshi Yonezu’s “Lost Corner” album, followed by offerings from Stray Kids and Six Tones.

For the January-March quarter, Sony posted a 197.7 billion yen ($1.3 billion) profit, up 5% from 189 billion yen the same quarter in the previous fiscal year. Sales were 2.6 trillion yen ($17.7 billion), down 24% from 3.48 trillion yen.

Sony is forecasting a nearly 13% drop in profit for the fiscal year through March 2026, to 930 billion yen ($6.3 billion), on 11.7 trillion yen ($80 billion) sales, down 2.9% on-year.

Sony officials are set to brief reporters on the latest company strategy for growth later in the day. Sony stocks lost 3% in Tokyo morning trading.

Google’s profits soared 28% in this year’s opening quarter, overcoming the competitive and legal threats that its internet empire is facing amid an economy roiled by a global trade war.

The numbers released Thursday by Google parent Alphabet Inc. indicated the company is rising to the challenge so far, but investors are likely to remain concerned about the turbulent times ahead.

The Mountain View, California, company earned $26.5 billion, or $2.15 per share, during the January-March period, up from $20.7 billion, or $1.64 per share, at the same time last year. Revenue rose 12% from last year to $96.5 billion. The results easily exceeded analysts’ projections, according to FactSet Research.

“We continued to see healthy growth and momentum across the business,” Alphabet CEO Sundar Pichai told analysts Thursday during a conference call.

Alphabet’s stock gained 4% in extended trading after the numbers came out. The shares had fallen by 16% since the end of last year.

Google’s first-quarter performance illustrated the continuing power of its long-dominant search engine in a sea of uncertainty. While grappling with competitive threats emerging as artificial intelligence reshapes technology, Google is also battling court decisions condemning its search engine and digital ad network as illegal monopolies.

The AI-driven upheaval has opened new opportunities for people to find helpful advice, insights and information through more conversational search options from the likes of OpenAI and Perplexity.

Google’s long-dominant search engine is countering the new competition with a feature called AI Overviews that appear above web links in its results. It is also testing a conversational tool called AI Mode that would usher in an even more radical change to its business model.

“The company delivered a sound response to those questioning the solidity of the search business amid ever-increasing AI demand,” Investing.com analyst Thomas Monteiro said.

But Google is trying to keep its business intact as by the U.S. Justice Department attempts to break up the company and impose other restraints after a federal judge last year branded its search engine an illegal monopoly. To make matters worse, its digital ad network also was found to be illegally abusing its power earlier this month in another case brought by the Justice Department.

President Donald Trump’s trade war has injected more uncertainty into the mix by rattling the financial markets amid fears the tariffs will reignite inflation while dragging the economy into a recession. Although Google’s digital services aren’t directly impacted by the tariffs, a recession would likely curtail the spending on ads that generate most of Alphabet’s revenue.

But there were few signs of a slowdown in the past quarter. Google’s ad revenue during the period totaled $72.5 billion, an 11% increase from the same time a year ago.

The steady growth emboldened Alphabet to stand firm on plans to invest $75 billion on AI and other technologies this year while also pursuing approval of a $32 billion deal to buy cybersecurity firm Wiz.