Tech Winners & Losers: Activision

Tech stocks slipped into the red Friday, along with the major market indices, despite strong earnings reports from companies such as ActivisionATVI, Priceline.comPCLN and RealNetworksRNWK.

Shares of video-games publisher Activision added $3.12, or 11.3%, to $30.82 after the company topped Street expectations for the fourth quarter and offered a strong outlook for the year.

Activision reported net income of $44.2 million vs. a loss of $14.4 million, the year before. Excluding charges, it posted earnings of 17 cents a share, compared with a loss of 4 cents a share a year ago. Revenue rose 92.8% to $602.5 million, beating Street expectations of 5 cents a share in earnings on revenue of $373.1 million.

For fiscal year 2009, Activision expects net revenue of $2.75 billion and earnings of 72 cents a share. Excluding the impact of deferred revenue for online-enabled games, the company forecast revenue of $3.1 billion for the year. That compares to Street estimates of $2.8 billion in revenue on earnings of $1.18 a share.

Digital infrastructure services company VeriSignVRSN was up $1.43, or 3.9%, to $38.22 after its first-quarter results beat analysts' estimates. VeriSign guided revenue from its core businesses in the current quarter in the range of $228 million to $233 million, in line with Street estimates of $228.1 million.

Sprint NextelS continued to gain on speculation of a buyout by Deutsche TelekomDT. Shares of Sprint were up 55 cents, or 6.2%, to $9.53.

RealNetworksRNWK was up 92 cents, or 14%, to $7.39 after the company said it expects second-quarter revenue ahead of Street estimates. The company also said it will spin off its games division and plans to buy back up to $50 million of stock.