About the most ridiculous argument the World of Tanks shills throw in everybody’s face constantly is, “With all the billions Wargaming makes, they don’t care about you!”
This argument gets thrown into the face of anybody that quits the game or criticizes it out of absolute frustration. There’s only one problem with that argument: It’s completely made up.
In order to understand just how off base and completely bogus that argument is, one just has to do a little homework and due diligence. Once one does that, one can only come to one conclusion:
Wargaming is about as crooked a company as you’ll ever come across.
That, unfortunately, is a fact. With the tactics Wargaming employed, they make ENRON look like the Boy Scouts. This story gets a bit long, and sadly there is no “too long / didn’t read” for it. That said, here we go:
Back when Wargaming was developing World of Tanks, which would become it’s biggest (and lets face it, ONLY) money maker, they were really at their financial ends. The select group of private investors had sunk pretty much all they could into it. It was at this point that these same investors were looking to branch out into different areas – namely: real estate.
Well, any business man can tell you that there’s only so much money to go around, and when it’s your money, you limit spending it any chance you get. It’s always better to spend someone else’s money than it is yours; that way, if something should go south, they lose their money, you walk away with yours still intact.
So what can a privately held business do to get more financing when they’ve pretty much run out of collateral and have hit their limit with financial institutions?
Get listed on the stock market. And that, friends, is exactly what Wargaming did.
Now, in order to get listed on the Cyprus Stock Exchange, Wargaming had to not only disclose all of its assets, but also how much money it was making at the time and project how much money they were going to make in the future. It’s standard operating procedure for pretty much every stock exchange on the planet.
Wargaming did exactly that on October 25, 2011. You can find Wargaming’s Stock Exchange Filing here.
Now, at this point, it should be noted that everything is above board, or so it seems. The only real issue is looking into this filing one finds some interesting tidbits of information. Namely, the value they are placing on their stocks vs. how much they’re projecting they’re going to make. Here’s what Wargaming said they were worth:
- 3,400,000 shares @10C each minimum value and 1€ already issued.
In other words, they’re saying that all of the shareholders combined have 3,400,000 shares that they value at 1€ each. It also states that no matter what, they have a minimum value of 10C (or about 11 cents U.S.)
Then, they float another 10,000,000 shares as authorized share capitol at 10C as well. So, at this point, what we have are 13,400,000 shares with a minimum value of 1,340,000€ or $1,474,201.
So where’s the billions you ask? Well, they simply don’t exist at this point. As they say on those TV sale ads though, “But wait! There’s more!”
Then you read just a bit further and you find this
All of the New Ordinary Shares will, upon Admission, rank pari passu in all respects with the existing Ordinary Shares in issue at the date of this document including the right to receive all future dividends and other distributions declared, paid or made in respect of the Ordinary Shares after Admission.
That’s a pretty neat trick, isn’t it? So this is probably the part where you ask, “Why do this?” Well, here’s what Wargaming themselves said in that very same document:
GOALS – TARGETS – PROSPECTS – BUSINESS PLAN – FUNDRAISING
Reasons for Admission
The principle reason for the Listing is to operate under a proper EU structure, which will allow the Company to pursue its aggressive expansion drive correctly. The Company intends to utilize to the full the tax advantages that Cyprus offers and this is already much in evident for billing in the EU and paying EU’s lowest VAT rate in Cyprus. Furthermore, by being a listed company on a recognized EU member stock exchange such as Cyprus, the Company will be in a position to enter into Mergers & Acquisitions, either by cash or through issue of shares to reach its objective of accelerate growth of its core business as well as expansion into new markets, especially in the emerging countries. For 2012, the Company intends to intensify its efforts to penetrate the US market while in 2013 the aggressive expansion into China will be implemented.
Sounds legit, does it not? The reason this statement is relevant is because the argument made by all the World of Tank shills and trolls is that they don’t care, that they don’t need the EU, that they are so rich they don’t need anybody. So how could they not care when they just said they do and did some very creative valuation to do exactly that? We’ll get back to that a bit later.
So where is all this money? Well, lets start by taking a look at what Wargaming had done at this point in time and what they actually hoped to do. Here is their Projected Cash Flow Statements for years 2011 to 2014:
[wptg_comparison_table id="1"]
So once again the question becomes, “Where’s the billions?” In short, there aren’t any. There never were any. That’s just more completely made up junk by the World of Tanks shills and trolls.
So what in fact did happen? Well, this is where it all goes pear shaped. The next time we get an official financial statement from Wargaming is in April of 2013, a year-and-a-half later. So what does it tell us? Well, it tells us that something very, very suspect is going on at the very least.
The only numbers we have that cover an entire year on this report, or for the entire history of Wargaming for that matter, is 2012. So lets all take a look at how the actual numbers from 2012 stack up to the projections they made for 2012 back in October of 2011:
[wptg_comparison_table id="2"]
This is where anybody in their right mind sits up, looks at this, and says, “how in the name of all that is holy did THAT happen?”
It is, at best, laughable on its face. So laughable in fact that it begs a closer look by the likes of Interpol. So what the hell happened in 2012? That’s a good question and it deserves a good answer.
What we know is that in 2012, immediately after getting listed, Wargaming went on a spending spree. In August of 2012, they bought the Big World engine that powers their games for $45,000,000. That’s a good chunk of change. Then in January of 2013, they bought Day 1 Studios for another $20,000,000. Just one month later in February, the purchased Gas Powered Games for an undisclosed amount.
So, if we go back a very short time in history to October 2011, and we roll forward just one year, Wargaming somehow increased it’s capital value by 1,382 percent!
Not even Bernie Madoff managed to do that. It’s an increase so incredible that it’s…well…incredible.
Remember that TV deal? But wait! There’s more!
After the financial report of all that money in April of 2013 that covered full year 2012, Wargaming would never, ever again file one single financial report.
Around the end of 2013, the Cyprus Stock Exchange began wondering what the holdup was with Wargaming filing it’s financial reports. By the spring of 2014, all Wargaming stocks were frozen from trading until such time as Wargaming came clean and caught up with all of the financial reports it had failed to file.
Wargaming never filed a single thing. By December of 2014, Cyprus had had enough. Wargaming stocks were kicked off the Cyprus Stock Exchange and they’ve never been listed anywhere ever since.
Now, to hear the corporate shills tell it, Wargaming did all of that on purpose because they don’t need the EU Stock Exchange and have more money than God. What’s even more ridiculous are some of those same people spreading stories about Wargaming grossing 500,000,000 dollars last year.
Those stories are, of course, completely false. They are fabricated based on the increase of the original projections and the financial report of 2013 that was never validated at all by any follow up reports.
In the end, Wargaming on its face looks exactly like ENRON, Bernie Madoff, Lehman Brothers, and other “cook the books” companies. All it takes is one good valuation done with “creative” accounting, and then you just ride out financing for as long as you possibly can.
It remains to be seen just how much longer Wargaming’s ride is going to last, but with the complete and epic failure of World of Warplanes, and the lackluster success of World of Warships as well as the decline in player base of World of Tanks, it in all likelihood is not going to be for much longer.
I fear it is worse than that, I am a player of the game, have been since 2012-2013, I think WarGaming has those billions in offshore accounts and invested in tidy somes in the Scam Gift Card Company Karma Koin INC. You see War Gaming has branch companies in Canada, the USA and worldwide known as EB and EA Games. I go down to the Mall at the CountyFair Mall in New Minas, KIngs County, Nova Scotia, Canada for my monthly dose of about $50 a month in Karma Koin Cards…..addictive….yep. Sadly I could for that money run my own gaming company if I put the investment in an business. EB Games has many gaming stores in the Annapolis Valley and to work there you have to lie alot about War Gaming being an honest game, I had no idea about it being in Recievership a year after the game came out of WorldofTanks, now WorldofWarships and WorldofWarplanes……….$14,300,000 CAD!
I think War Gaming has links to The Canadian Mob as well as the Russian Mob, mostlikely and it’s developers as well as the packratting Cheatbotting Players have the money wrapped up in some 90 Billion Accounts that are fake as a $3 USA Mint Bill.
I want to update this website with new information. I have based certain calcuations on my own estimates as to what WorldofTanks and War Gaming makes thanks to flimflamming game player clients; for instance through my calculations there are some 45,000,000 Client Players of WoT WorldWide buying Karma Koin Cards in the unit range of some 41 KKCs every 2-3 years or so. This is not counting the Interact Visa nor PayPal Bank Card Transactions either, considering Karma Koin Card financial Transactions I have been shafted myself to the tune of $1,125.00 CAD. So if you multiply that by 45 Million you get some very interesting results; I have also found some cards of KKC default at times based on my buying 14 KKCs just this month at about $60, this is for various reasons. Some cards according to the KKC Support Website have never existed in their system, while others are “invalid”. Still others have from 5 to 6 Dollars skimmed off of them, while still others send “Error” Messages while you loose from $25 to abit lower $10 on atleast 5 transactions in 4 weeks. This staggering amount of War Gaming and EB-EA Skimming worldwide amounts to a whooping $5,667, 300,000 every 3 years. From my spendings from 2012 to 2016;, considering more client players can spend about $5, 125.00 per year on Karma Kion Cards I think this prints a grim picture on EB-EAGames and War Gaming as well as WorldofTanks.
We have yet to explore the 9,000,000 Million Players and their illegal Faked Accounts that they use to hack the WorldofTanks servers as well as the RNG Program that determines wins and losses. So here goes; 9 Million Players paying between $1000 up to $5000 in Karma Koin Cards defrauds the game of WorldofTanks a mere fleabite of $629,700,000 which War Gaming pockets as the runoff of their cheating people that have an addciton to that game. I certainly hoped you liked my cheery math on this subject.
I do have doubts about WG’s finances as well, something is very fishy
@Thing1 and Gomez_Adams
https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2016-02-25/world-of-tanks-video-game-mints-a-new-billionaire-from-belarus
A bought and paid for bogus story to try to gain the confidence of prospective bank finace. Check their source for the figures in that article. Then check THAT source for those figures. You’ll find they all go back to the same bloated, fake, bogus projections they made back in 2011 to get listed on the Cyprus Stock Exchange. At this point, NOBODY has any clue what they’ve made since 2012. It’s all bullshit smoke and mirrors.
They were kicked off the Cyprus stock exchange because they stopped filing all their financial reports as required by EU law. You know why? Because they weren’t making any of their projections and creditors were going to shut off their credit line.
Their entire income stream is completely unknown. The last we know AS FACT is 2012. They made 6.7 million Euro in 2012…when the game was in a much better financial situation than it is now. That’s it. Since then, they’ve spend 10’s of millions buying out other developers and what do they have to show for it?
Jack shit.
– Thing 1
Fishy like all the fish in Denmark. Or perhaps like Giant beached Whales when they swim up on the beach to die sometimes? Fishy, indeed. Fishy = Wargaming.
If I was to look for say Wargaming’s Financial Statements, its impossible to find anything on it but when it comes to EA (Electronic Arts) they are very transparent about it:
http://investor.ea.com/financials.cfm
If you had bothered to read the story, you would see the first, last, and ONLY financial statement Wargaming ever made. When you’re listed on any stock exchange, you have to file quarterly (usually) or semi-annual earnings reports (at the very least) each and every year.
That was why Wargaming were kicked off the stock exchange to begin with: they simply refused to disclose their financials. Once kicked off and no longer listed, they have no need or requirement to ever file another one.
The story tells you all of that. Read it.
– Thing 1
As if Wargaming is not showing how desperate they are, they have now chosen to remove Colorado, New Mexico and Fuso BB stock hulls and reimplementing as premium ships, this also happened to Nagato BB where she lost her double funnel hull which was the stock hull and then WG reimplemented it as a Mutsu BB and sell it for $$$$$$$$$$ and then on the other side you have people defending Wargaming for what they are doing, totally gobsmacking
I don’t get it. So they’re making two American premium BB’s out of the Colorado and New Mexico? I presently have the Colorado and actually just got it maxed out a week ago.
Correct thats what insiders connected to the Armored Patrol has admitted, Wargaming is looking at making Colorado, Fuso and New Mexico BB’s stock hull as downtiered premiums which players must pay for
Well, I don’t HAVE to pay for a damn thing. It’s a free to play game. Frankly, I’ve got every premium ship I could ever need right now, so they’re wasting their efforts as far as I’m concerned.
@Thing1
By any chance have you seen this?:
http://cyprus-mail.com/2015/02/15/wargaming-heroes-or-martyrs/
Some time ago. It didn’t really work out that way though.
The last Greek debt restructure really screwed Hellenic Bank hard. What they did was, in effect, split the debt; a large chunk of which was owned by Hellenic. It’s the same trick you pull with stocks to try to increase their value. Here’s the layman’s example:
You’ve got 100 bonds worth 10 dollars each. As time goes by, due to the economy, lost jobs, lost income, etc., they decrease in value to only 1 dollar. So you split them in half via paperwork and what you wind up with are 200 shares worth 50 cents each.
The hope in doing that is that with more bonds you can sell them to more people. If you can do that, more sales bring in more money so the value of the bonds increase. As that value increases you’re hoping to not only regain the money you lost initially, but actually increase it.
It’s a gamble that many companies in really bad shape try as a last resort. It very seldom works unless you’re already a very successful company that people are just dying to buy into.
The last restructure of Greek debt was essentially a huge stock split and it didn’t work. Not only did it not work, property values (which Wargaming have been buying up on credit as fast as they could) have plummeted to all time lows. That screwed them even harder. They bought it cheap thinking it couldn’t get any cheaper and were simply gambling that the new debt deal would give people the money to start buying again and they’d make big money.
It didn’t work. The economy is still shit, money is nearly worthless and the property values got even lower. Wargaming are now having to pay off tons of real estate mortgages they can’t sell. It is, quite literally, as bad as it can get. There’s been a slight rebound lately, but at present they’re not even back to the values that they had when they went on a buying spree.
Why do you think Wargaming have shut down studios, locations and laid off hundreds of people the last three years? Why do you think they’re hurling shit into the game hand over fist and turning it into an undecipherable quagmire of shit?
They’re absolutely desperate for money. They’re fucked coming and going.
@Thing1
Not sure if this suprises you, ever since World of Warships started tanking/stagnating, Wargaming has been chucking premium ships like there is no tomorrow also the latest happening is that some of the supertesters are no longer testing unreleased content for world of warships or have uninstalled the game completely
This all sounds about right. Textbook WG again. Scheme Capitalism at it’s finest once again, gaming the system at everything around them, including customers, employees, players, business decisions, but what keeps grabbing them by the arse are the laws of economics, burning bridges behind them as they go, disgruntled customers, firing at their own feet, and just plain can’t be honest !!
But, that article praises their brilliance etc. Boy, they sure do snow people don’t they LOL… (or they keep looking for better paid articles to do so… etc. Atleast for their forum shills, or investors etc.) Well, when you’re in the money $ laundering capital of the world it really says something about you doesn’t it? No wonder the players can’t get a fair human shake?
@Insurrectional_Leftist, I would not be surprised if World of Tanks and World of Warships went the same way as Armoured Warfare, I seriously would not be surprised
@ Alex, Yes the wonders may never cease with this Greek tragedy as time wears on? I think this one will have jolts and kicks, denial, pathetic moans, violins playing as did when the Titanic went down, shock an disbelief for a few, a slurping sound that you hear as the bath water drains down the bath tub slowing then an suddenly collapse toward the end (possibly unannounced ?) The vision of Battle Ships sinking as in WOW, in some of those games.
@Insurrectional_Leftist and Thing1
The signs to WOWS (World of Warships) collapse is already there, the developers at Lesta Studio or the studio at Minsk are chucking premium ships at World of Warships like there is no tomorrow, which is a sure sign that Wargaming is getting desperate, I believe Wargaming is in its final stages and once the collapse happens, those who have invested big time money into World of Tanks or World of Warships, even if the bankers decide to sell World of Tanks or World of Warships to another developer or publisher, I bet no one will want to buy it
The signs to WOWS (World of Warships) collapse is already there,
Well, one thing is for sure: When you piss off Gomez to the point he uninstalls a game he absolutely loved, you have really seriously fucked up big time.
@Thing1
That is so true, I neither play randoms much at all on WOWS, in fact I have cut my time playing WOWS and also did you know many people are not happy with how Wargaming is releasing the Royal Navy Battleship line into World of Warships as well as the lower tier ships only contain fantasy upgrades
They release some notes on 9.20 Supertest of Rebalanced Vehicles coming up for the Japanese, German, French lines. There is a bit of crying, and anger over some of those nerfs, & changes on those threads now already ( only a very few good points). Not being received that well.
http://forum.worldoftanks.com/index.php?/topic/547767-920-supertest-of-rebalanced-vehicles-french-tanks/
http://forum.worldoftanks.com/index.php?/topic/547533-920-supertest-of-rebalanced-vehicles-japanese-tanks/
http://forum.worldoftanks.com/index.php?/topic/548286-920-supertest-of-rebalanced-vehicles-german-tanks/
I would say more are coming.
They’ve created such a complete fucking mess with their “spam OP premiums and new lines into the game to make money” strategy that they will have to spend the next year trying to balance the shit they already have. That’s the problem with the “pump and dump” strategy: every single time you introduce anything you make matters worse for yourself, not better.
@Thing1
They are doing the same with World of Warships as well
@Thing1 and Insurrectional_Leftist
Not sure if you have seen this, looks like Wargaming has also closed their studio in Seattle as well since last year:
http://www.pocketgamer.biz/news/63820/wargaming-reiterates-commitment-to-mobile-gaming/
@Thing1, Gomez_Adams and Insurrectional_Leftist
By any chance have you seen this?:
https://www.pcinvasion.com/chris-taylor-leaves-wargaming-seattle-start-indie-studio
Old news.
He was yet another in a very long line of completely failed investments by Wargaming. Gas Powered Games sucked. Huge. Always. Wargaming bought them out thinking they’d get all kinds of usable software that would make them millions. It turned out to be the opposite: it cost them millions. LOTS of millions.
The only reason that complete idiot even had a job was because it was part of the buyout clause that they keep him on. He was useless before Wargaming came along, he was useless his entire time at Wargaming, and he’ll be useless doing whatever the fuck it is his useless ass does next.
There are ways to audit WG from what information is available to the general public. The most time consuming would be to look at every premium tank they sell on wot-life.com at any given time and then compare those numbers to a time three months, six months or one year afterwards and see how many they sold for each and multiply by the cost (assume 75% buy the basic tank and not the full tank package).
This will give you a general idea of the amount they make from premiums. You also would have to know what tanks were promotions and not include them in the amount of revenue from premium tanks. If it is a mixture of promotion and sales, you would have to make an estimate of how many were sold as compared to how many were free from promotions like marathons and giveaways, which can be hard to do.
What also could be done is get an estimate of how many players play premium accounts from either information given out by WG in the past or from other sources which might track this information. Worst case scenario would be to make an estimate based on the fact that only 25% of players spend money on the game and you would assume half of those buy premium tanks and the other half have premium accounts. Not an exact science, but would give you a good estimate derived from server populations.
Once you have those two numbers from all servers (premium tank sales and premium accounts) you have a good rough estimate of the revenue WG is bringing in from the game. You would have to also account for any other sales outside of these two items, like boosters, etc., and make rough estimates based on a poll on the forum of who buys these things and then create an estimated percentage based on all server populations that you can use later as populations decrease.
The Hellenic Bank has changed leadership recently and has shown a loss this quarter. I am currently researching their recent history and who the owners of this bank are. I am looking into stock issues to see if anytime they need money they just do what Tesla does and have another stock offering to dilute shares. Are they suffering perpetual losses? What are their holdings? What is the value of those holdings and what is the risk involved? Their credit rating has recently went from CCC to B-. The companies that rate credit ratings are often just part of the large “one hand washes the other garbage that goes on in financial industries,” and might serve a purpose. They might be looking to borrow more money and this nicely timed up in their credit rating makes it more likely to do so. I don’t know yet, I have to look more closely at what they typically have done over time.
I will do some research on the bank to get an idea of how they are doing financially. Could it be a way to wash money? Could it be a tax haven? Could it be a way to transfer assets in a massive shell game? I have to look at who does business with them. Could buying the stake in the bank be WGs way of moving their cash around while maintaining better tax status? Did they buy it in the financial crisis in the hopes of turning a large profit when the economy recovered? Is it an investment or is it used to help the operations of WG as a business entity?
I will try to find out these things by looking at what this bank does and why companies choose this bank and this country to do business with.
@ Shadora please do and as for being in a massive shell game I would place my money that they are involved in money laundering for the Russian mob. Considering that they went bankrupt in the UK in order to avoid showing their financial records, and secondly owning part of a bank that is considered a haven for Russian Money laundry purposes… Man where in hell have you ever heard that a video gaming company actively owning a bank?
Also
https://trends.google.com/trends/explore?q=%2Fm%2F0c03cdz
Down 40% from this time last year in interest of the game.
One more thing you should know about counting numbers of a player base.
1. The number of registered players. – These are the numbers that all advertising companies use to bloat their performance. Generally ignore these numbers.
2. Active player base (per hour) This number is derived by actual counting of the people online using sites such as VB addict. It’s pretty simple. Take for example the NA server. Get the numbers for each hour at the end a 24 hour time period, add them all together and divide by 24 and you will get an accurate(as possible) player count per hour.
#2 is by far the most important hard core information that it is very hard to discredited. The problem with #2 though that is probably not able to discern how many bots are online AND people using the WoT for watching their Replays. Because you have to sign in with your client to talk to a server and I believe that those contacts (as well as bots) are counted as “players online”
3. Actual player base. This is by far the hardest to do due to the fact that no company is going to give out that sort of information.
I believe that there are around 3 million people playing this game I’ve done some numbers myself). The most I can see this company right now can be making is 300 million gross. The least is around 120 million gross.
I am betting on the lower amount because of approx 60 to 70% of play base come from poor countries. They don’t have the money to pay for it except by cheating. That is why you see so many cheaters on WoT in general.
Mind this is GROSS profit and not net profit. And I am betting on the 100 million mark as gross profit coming from this game.
I’ve already repeatedly (at the other forum) what a 40 million registered company is on a game and compared it to WoT 130+ million play base they have stated and using Goggle trends and you can see the BS lies that Wot throws out.
Do your research and lets find out the real truth on why this company is hiding so many things…
What Charlie said. That would be fucking epic.
I have learned a lot about the bank and it’s likely purpose. I have read many of the regulations for Cyprus and why they chose this location. There is more to it than taxes and investments. I can paint a good picture of its future from it’s recent past. I am new to this site and would like to have permission to create a 3 to 5 part post of WG financial information.
The first part would be the bank. The bank will be an eye opener. It might need to be 3 parts. There is a lot to it.
The second subject would be an educated estimate based off of known facts to WG’s revenue for this year where I will try to recreate an income statement from those facts, educated estimates and industry norms.
Finally, I would like to summarize the previous posts and formulate a reasonable prediction of where this game is heading.
Note: there will be many links to any facts and I might need to screenshoot some of the quotes. Do you recommend quoting something and providing a link or screenshots with links?
I am new to this site and would like to have permission to create a 3 to 5 part post of WG financial information.
Read this.