THQ ticks higher as Dow dips

As most game stock languish, THQ is on the rise. At the midpoint in trading today on the Nasdaq in New York, shares of the Incredibles publisher were up more than 5 percent to $32.27 on volume nearly double its average. At one point, the stock was up $2.00 since the trading day began. Shares of THQI opened at 30.14, traded down a nickel for a few minutes, and hit an intraday high of $32.43 at 1:11pm EDT--a new 52-week high.

Other game stocks, as well as most major indices, were not so lucky. At the opening bell, the Dow traded 100 points off its close yesterday, feeling the aftershocks of today's terrorist bombings in London. The index has since recovered and at press time was trading only 13 points off yesterday's close. Other game stocks offered no spectacular movement, save for Atari, which, on sluggish volume, was off a dime, nearly 4 percent off yesterday's closing price of $2.60.

As for the optimism behind the boost to THQ, Wedbush Morgan Securities analyst Michael Pachter told GameSpot today that solid sales of Destroy All Humans! may be behind the surge. "Apparently, people--including me--were pessimistic about Destroy All Humans!" Pachter said, adding that "It looks to be selling well." In recent statistics compiled by Electronics Boutique, the PlayStation 2 and Xbox versions of the game (released June 21) are the specialty chain's number two and three best-selling console SKUs.

"There was some pessimism about the company's ability to meet expectations in the June quarter--hence the decline from $31 to $27 over the last few weeks--and the pessimism appears to have been unfounded," concluded Pachter. "There is probably a bit of short covering here, but if the shorts thought that THQ was going to miss the quarter, they were mistaken."

[UPDATE] THQ ended the day at $32.23, up $1.59 (+5.19 percent) from yesterday's close. Volume was 1,892,038 shares, more than three times its most recent 10-day average of 547,600. The Dow Jones Industrial Average ended the day up 31.61 points, closing at 10302.29.