Smilegate quietly unloaded final 2.59 percent stake in Wemade Play

Game publisher Smilegate unloaded a final 2.59 percent stake in Wemade Play last year amid tumbling share prices of Wemade's smaller gaming affiliate.

“It is true that Smilegate sold the remaining stake of Wemade Play,” Smilegate spokesperson told the Korea JoongAng Daily, without mentioning the specific period of the sell-off. “There was no particular reason behind the decision to divest the stake, only that it was done for investment purposes.”

The stock price of the Kosdaq-listed unit has slipped due to the instability of the value of Wemix cryptocurrency tokens and the temporary delisting of Wemix in the crypto exchange market for a few months last year.

Smilegate Holdings, the holding company behind the game publisher, in 2018 retained a 35.52 percent stake in Wemade Play, then known as SundayToz, the developer behind hit mobile game franchise Anipang.

In December 2021, Wemade bought a 20.9 percent stake of SundayToz from Smilegate for 84 billion won ($62.76 million) with the aim of expanding its game portfolio to casual games and social casino games using non-fungible tokens (NFTs) through its blockchain platform Wemix.

Wemade changed the name of SundayToz to Wemade Play in March 2022.

Smilegate continued to sell off partial stakes of Wemade Play between 2021 and 2022 as the value of Wemix coins remained unstable and it was delisted by Korea’s Digital Asset eXchange Alliance (DAXA) in December 2022.

With its latest sale, Smilegate has sold off all of its stake in Wemade Play.

Wemade Play shares on Wednesday closed at 10,950 won, declining 45.79 percent then the 52-week high share price of 20,200 won on Feb. 23, 2023.

BY LEE JAE-LIM [lee.jaelim@joongang.co.kr]