Clash of gaming titans on the WSE. Big increases vs. sharp declines

• After CD Projekt presented a tech demo for "The Witcher 4," investors rushed to buy shares of Poland's largest game developer, driving the valuation to new, multi-year highs. They don't mind the fact that the game won't see the light of day until 2027.
• However, after the PCF Group board announced that it had withdrawn from work on two projects, the supply of the company's shares exceeded the wildest expectations, bringing the price to historic lows. There is no end in sight to the declines for now.
• CD Projekt is listed in the WIG20 index with a valuation of PLN 26 billion. The capitalization of PCF Group fell to PLN 200 million, even though in 2020 the company debuted on the WSE with a valuation of PLN 1.4 billion.

On June 5, 2025, CD Projekt shares are traded 36 percent higher than on the last day of December 2024. In the case of PCF Group, the rate of return since the beginning of this year has been negative (-30 percent).

Demo presented, emotions heated, shares bought

CD Projekt presented a tech demo of "The Witcher 4" on June 3, which surprisingly stimulated investors present on the Warsaw Stock Exchange. The demo version shows how the company is developing the technology that will create the world of "The Witcher 4".

- Presenting the early effects of our work directly on the Unreal Engine 5, running at 60 frames per second on PlayStation 5, is an important step for us and proof of the great cooperation between both teams (CD Projekt is developing the new technology together with Epic Games - editor's note). But this is just the beginning - we still have a lot of work ahead of us. I am looking forward to further progress and inspiring solutions that will be created as part of this cooperation during the further creation of "The Witcher 4" on the Unreal Engine 5 - indicates the joint CEO of CD Projekt Michał Nowakowski.

During the presentation, a number of Unreal Engine 5 tools developed for the open world of "The Witcher 4" were shown. Among the technologies were:

• Unreal Animation Framework , responsible for natural, fluid character movements in crowded scenes;
• FastGeo Streaming , developed by CD Projekt together with Epic Games, enabling fast loading of the environment;
• Nanite Foliage , allowing you to fill forests and fields with dense vegetation without affecting performance;
• ML Deformer , which enhances character animations with subtle details about muscle work.

The demo was presented on Tuesday, June 3. At that time, one CD Projekt share was valued at around PLN 220. Today is Thursday (June 5) and one security costs PLN 260 , after investors raised the valuation by 7 and 9 percent in two days in response to the presented version. CD Projekt's current capitalization is around PLN 26 billion.

They debuted at the best possible moment. Now they're scraping the bottom

On the other side of the gaming river there is another digital entertainment producer listed on the WSE, about which great hopes were once pinned, namely PCF Group.

At the end of May this year, the group reported a net loss in the first quarter of 2025, but the truly bad news was yet to come to the broad market. On June 1, the company's management decided to suspend and halt work on two game projects: "Gemini" and "Bifrost". At the same time, a decision was made to reduce the development team by over 50 people.

As reported by the company, the publisher did not present the conditions for the implementation of further stages of production of the "Gemini" project covering the period after the termination of the current implementation agreement. The Wrocław-based company also did not receive information from the publisher regarding the will to continue the project.

"This has led to significant uncertainty regarding the publisher's intentions to complete the "Gemini" project. Taking the above into account, the management board assesses that further cooperation between the group and the publisher on its implementation is questionable," we read in the current report of PCF Group.

In turn, the decision to suspend further work on the "Bifrost" project, carried out in the self-publishing model (i.e. from own funds) is the result of the problems described above. They resulted in a lack of prospects for providing organizational resources and funds for further financing of the production and publication of "Bifrost".

PCF Group debuted on the Warsaw Stock Exchange in December 2020, a “covid” year that turned out to be a bull market for gaming companies. At that time, the relatively large IPO enjoyed considerable interest from investors, and the reduction in retail subscriptions was as much as 98 percent.

Shortly after its debut, the share price reached a historic high of over PLN 85; currently, one share costs around PLN 5, which gives a valuation of just PLN 200 million.