Game says sales down but margins up

The group, which trades from 1,365 stores, concessions and franchises in nine European countries and Australia, forecast first-half profit before one off items of between 13 million pounds and 16 million pounds, down from 36.4 million pounds in the previous year.

Game said that in the 21 weeks to June 27 group like-for-like sales fell 15.4 percent.

It said the fall was in line with expectations given very strong sales in the comparative period.

It said it had seen "good gross margin growth" due to higher margin software and accessory sales being a larger part of the sales mix.

Shares in Game have lost 43 percent of their value over the last year, underperforming the FTSE All Share General Retailers index <.FTASX5370> by 49 percent.

The stock closed Wednesday at 164.5 pence, valuing the business at 570 million pounds.

(Reporting by James Davey, editing by Rhys Jones; Editing by Hans Peters)