Thanks to "better than expected consumer response to its holiday slate worldwide," Activision today raised its third quarter and full year fiscal outlook. This is largely due to the great success of Guitar Hero III and Call of Duty 4: Modern Warfare.

For the holiday period (third quarter ending Dec. 31), Activision now expects record net revenues of $1.225 billion and earnings per share of $0.66. This is up from the previous guidance of net revenues of $1.050 billion and earnings of $0.51 per share.

For the full year ending in March, the publisher is anticipating record net revenues of $2.30 billion and earnings per share of $0.75. This is significantly higher compared to its previous outlook of net revenues of $2.07 billion and earnings per share of $0.55.

"We are well on our way to delivering our 16th consecutive year of revenue growth and the most profitable year in our history," stated Robert Kotick, Chairman and CEO, Activision, Inc. "We are confident that the third quarter of fiscal 2008 will be the largest and most profitable quarter ever. Guitar Hero III: Legends of Rock and our newly released Call of Duty 4: Modern Warfare already are two of the biggest entertainment titles this year. Due to the strong consumer response to our slate through October and strong retail sales over the Thanksgiving weekend, we are raising our financial outlook for the December quarter and the fiscal year."

He continued, "As an organization we continue to exceed our growth goals. This year, we expect that we will generate operating margins in our peak cycle target range, which is about two to three years ahead of plan. We continue to strengthen and grow our franchise portfolio and internal development resources with new brands like Guitar Hero and Transformers and the acquisition of Bizarre Creations. This combined with our market momentum and the expanding installed hardware base worldwide, should enable us to continue growing our top and bottom line results through the remainder of this console cycle."