Electronic Arts is now a private company.
Late Tuesday, the game maker behind The Sims and Battlefield confirmed that a Saudi-led consortium had finished buying it for $55 billion. Saudi Arabia's Public Investment Fund (PIF), the country's big state investment fund, led the group, with Silver Lake and Affinity Partners also helping to finance the deal. Affinity Partners is the investment firm run by Jared Kushner, President Donald Trump's son-in-law.
For shareholders, the ending is simple.
The purchase is part of Saudi Arabia's wider push into sports and gaming. Turqi Alnowaiser, who heads PIF's international investments, said, "entertainment and sports are key areas of strategic focus."
With this deal, PIF gains direct ownership of a major publisher and its best-known franchises. It is a bigger commitment to gaming than a minority stake, and it fits the fund's stated focus on entertainment and sports. The purchase is also believed to be the biggest leveraged buyout ever. A leveraged buyout is when a company is bought mostly with borrowed money, and that company is expected to make enough cash to pay the debt back.
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The fund borrowed a reported $20 billion from JPMorgan, the bank that advised on the deal, to help close the purchase. The deal is a sign of how much money Saudi Arabia is willing to put behind entertainment.
The borrowed money comes with real pressure. The debt has to be paid even if a game flops.
Analysts have warned that EA is taking on a heavy debt load, and they question what will happen to the games and characters it owns. The big question is whether EA's games can bring in enough cash to cover those payments.
Michael Futter, founder of F-Squared, told CNBC the debt probably will not make EA change its strategy. "The debt hanging over their head isn't likely to create a shift in strategy," he said.
He expects leadership to protect the titles that already bring in the most money. "Instead, it will likely see leadership entrench themselves in the titles they think have the largest revenue potential, even if those also carry the largest risk," he said.
Futter also questioned whether EA can make its debt payments without painful choices. "I don't know how EA is going to service this debt without significant layoffs, studio closures, and possibly IP sell-off," he said.
Other analysts expect the same cautious path. That points to more proven franchises such as The Sims and Battlefield, plus sports titles, and fewer bets on new intellectual property.
For investors, the deal is a reminder that big, familiar companies can leave the public market entirely. EA no longer has shareholders to answer to, and its new owners have their own priorities.
If you own stock that gets bought out in a deal like this, the cash offer is final. The company stops being publicly traded, and there is no stock price to watch the next day.
For people who play the games, the real risk is creative. When a company carries a massive debt load, the safest choices win, and the safest choices are the games people already know.
Nobody knows yet how this ends for players or for the people who make the games. But the money is moving, and the choices that follow will be about what pays the bills, not just what makes a great game.
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