The stock price of Pearl Abyss Corp has fallen by, as of this writing, roughly 29.88 percent today, from 65,600 KRW (South Korean won) down to 46,000 KRW. The cause? I’m not a finance journalist, but it seems pretty clear that the reviews of Pearl Abyss’s massively hyped action RPG, Crimson Desert, might have something to do with it, as it’s currently sitting at an 80 on OpenCritic and 78 on Metacritic.
Still, those are pretty decent scores. Obviously not quite on the level of the high 90s that some expectant fans were hoping for, but is a 4 out of 5 average really enough to tank Pearl Abyss’s stock valuation that hard, or is there more to this story? Probably not, honestly. Trust me, I know it sounds a little ridiculous that Crimson Desert only being pretty good, as opposed to really good, could wipe out 30 percent of the stock price, but it does make sense when you take a look at the whole picture.
From December 30, 2025, to January 30, 2026, Pearl Abyss Corp’s stock price shot up by roughly 52.94 percent, from 37,400 KRW to 57,200 KRW. So what happened in that window that caused it to suddenly jump? Pearl Abyss announced that Crimson Desert had “gone gold” on January 22, which meant that the game would definitely meet its March 19 release date.
As Pearl Abyss is a publicly traded company, this caused investors to swarm the stock and increase its valuation. From here, Crimson Desert’s cleverly executed PR push resulted in the stock climbing higher and higher, until Pearl Abyss Corp’s share price hit an all-time high of 68,500 KRW on March 16; roughly a 125-percent increase when compared to its valuation on March 16, 2025.
Long story short, a bunch of investors bought in just before Crimson Desert’s hype reached fever pitch, then sold off their stocks this morning as soon as markets closed. But does this spell doom for Pearl Abyss? Nah, probably not. The company’s stock price is still currently higher than it was the year before, and things could bounce back pretty quickly once we know Crimson Desert’s sales numbers. We’ll be able to confirm exactly how much those review scores affected sales when the game is available on Steam in roughly eight hours.
