Assassin’s Creed developer Ubisoft pushes back earnings report after audit red flags

Ubisoft announced a delay in the release of its earnings report due to some mistakes found during an audit.

A mistake in Ubisoft’s records discovered during an audit has led to the company breaking certain loan agreements. The company also has to make a restatement of its earnings. 

Red flags found during audit of Ubisoft Entertainment SA

The French video-game publisher known for Assassin’s Creed, has delayed its earnings report for the first half of 2025-26 after an auditor’s review showed that the company had serious issues in its financial reporting. 

Auditors discovered that Ubisoft wrongly counted some partnership sales as revenue under IFRS 15. Due to this, the company had to redo its financial results. The auditors also said that some of the revenue from a deal signed in the second quarter of the 2026 fiscal year cannot be counted because it no longer meets the required accounting standards. 

These accounting changes mean that Ubisoft broke the rules of certain loan agreements as of September 30, 2025. The company intends to use the proceeds from a pending deal with Tencent Holdings Ltd. to repay roughly €286 million of outstanding debt early. 

The company stopped the trading of its shares and bonds during the delay, stating that it needs to prevent “unnecessary speculation” and keep the market stable.

Ubisoft CFO, Frédérick Duguet, reportedly told staff that the earnings results for the first half of the year would be published “in the coming days.” 

Ubisoft’s deal with Tencent Holdings 

In March 2025, Ubisoft announced the creation of a new subsidiary, now called Vantage Studios. This unit would manage its biggest game series, including Assassin’s Creed, Far Cry, and Tom Clancy’s Rainbow Six. 

Tencent will invest €1.16 billion (about $1.25 billion) into the subsidiary to own 25% of the outfit. Ubisoft’s press release stated that the investment will allow the company to pay down its debt and free up resources to further develop its products.

Ubisoft confirmed that its earnings report, once released, will show €490.8 million in Q2 net bookings, which is about 39% year-on-year growth, beating its own revenue projection of €450 million.  

Ubisoft started reducing its workforce in 2022 and continued the process into 2025 with multiple waves of layoffs. Most recently, in September 2025, the game developer’s global workforce had shrunk by about 1,500 employees, and the company says it’s about to save €100 million in fixed-cost expenses by fiscal 2026 to 2027.