A Reporter’s Leak About ‘Battlefield 2042’ May Have Cost EA $2 Billion And Gamers Are Stunned

Video games have to get delayed sometimes, that’s just a part of the development process. As much as developers wish they could meet deadlines and schedules perfectly, the truth is that the creative process fluctuates constantly, and video games are incredibly difficult to make. However, 2021 in particular has been brutal when it’s come to delays. The already difficult development process on top of the year that was 2020 has led to many developers being forced to delay their games from the original release dates.

These delays have ranged from just a month or two, to being more than a year. The recent Battlefield 2042 delay happened to fall on to the shorter side — Instead of releasing in October, it will release in November. It’s slightly disappointing, but nothing too drastic.

Unfortunately for EA, this delay happened to be way worse than they could ever be expected because the delay got leaked beforehand. One reporter, Jeff Grubb of Venture Beat, got wind that the delay was coming down the line, so he tweeted out the info he had. He did not say the game, he did not even indicate it would be EA. He just said that a video game was going to be delayed soon.

Of course, Grubb was not the only person to get wind of this leak. Leaks like this usually get out to multiple people well before they’re officially announced. The information on that leak must have made the rounds, though, because suddenly, EA’s stock fell $2 billion in a day, which of course sent everyone back to the source. Jeff Grubb you have tanked an entire company’s stocks with a single tweet!

This was before everyone knew that the game was only being delayed a month, but the damage had been done. EA’s stocks were plummeting because everyone heard that a delay was going to happen — at least, that’s how it looked.

Then when the delay was officially out it turned out to only be for a month which means, if the stock for EA really did plummet because one reporter did their job, then it was a little bit of an overreaction.