Activision Blizzard ($ATVI) saw its stock value soar in price when Microsoft announced its intention to acquire the company last Tuesday. But prior to this, it was anything by smooth sailing for the company, which has been facing lawsuits for alleged workplace harassment, discrimination, and sexual abuse that has been allowed to happen in the company for many years. Activision Blizzard's stock value would experience a dip whenever news about the lawsuit hit headlines. But according to Bobby Kotick, Activision Blizzard CEO, that isn't exactly the case.
Speaking to Venture Beat, Kotick was asked how the lawsuit by the California State's Department of Fair Employment and Housing factored in the decision to sell Activision Blizzard to Microsoft since the lawsuit seemed to have affected stock prices. To this, Kotick says:
“I think what affected the stock price more than that is pushing out Overwatch and Diablo. And then I think people started to see that this year’s Call of Duty wasn’t performing as well. So I think certainly the [California Department of Fair Employment and Housing] filing and the Wall Street Journal article contributed to that, but stocks go up and down for a variety of reasons. I think our view was that at $95 a share with all cash, that’s a really great deal for our shareholders. And so that was an easy and independent judgment. It’s a great deal.”
Read also: How much is Bobby Kotick's net worth?
It's hard to simply take Kotick's word in this, as a cursory look at the company's stock charts will show that its stock value does indeed fall steeply whenever news about the lawsuit arises. Granted, news about Overwatch 2 and Diablo 4 delays did affect the stock prices negatively as well, but those who have been following the lawsuit would know that those two games could attribute their delays to the allegations as well. Diablo‘s director Luis Barriga and designer Jesse McCree left the company after being tied to the case, while Overwatch‘s Jeff Kaplan left the project in what appeared to be his way of protesting the company's cultural rot. Activision Blizzard has openly acknowledged that the delays of both games have been due to these departures. Hence, even when the dips are caused by the delays, they are still indirectly affected by the lawsuits.
But all that is in the past now as Activision Blizzard experiences a resurgence thanks to its acquisition by Microsoft, and Bobby Kotick appears to be riding on to the sunset when the acquisition gets finalized around June 2023. As Kotick remains to be the company's CEO until the acquisition gets finalized, we can only hope that when Xbox Game Studios boss Phil Spencer finally takes over by then, we will no longer have any of these harassments and misconducts in these companies.
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