Sony just agreed to Microsoft’s proposal on ‘Call of Duty’

Microsoft Corp (NASDAQ: MSFT) has signed a binding agreement with Sony Corp (TYO: 6758) to keep “Call of Duty” available on PlayStation after taking over Activision Blizzard.

Alex Kantrowitz reacts to the news

Things seem to continue moving in the right direction for the $69 billion merger. Just last week, a U.S. federal judge denied the FTC’s motion for an injunction to stop Microsoft from buying Activision Blizzard (read more).

In response, the Competition and Markets Authority of the United Kingdom also extended the deadline to review the said acquisition to August 29^th. On CNBC’s “Worldwide Exchange”, Alex Kantrowitz of Big Technology said today:

FTC is out of the picture right now and it seems like the U.K. CMA is going to accelerate its decision and this deal could go through fairly imminently.

Shares of Activision Blizzard are up 4.0% this morning.

Here’s what the deal means for shareholders

Note that Microsoft had previously announced a deal with Nintendo as well under which it agreed to not making “Call of Duty” exclusive to Xbox for 10 years.

Kantrowitz sees the Microsoft-Activision as a long-term tailwind for the stock price. But in the near-term, he doesn’t expect more than just a bump.

Maybe you’ll see a small bump, but real impact will be long-term; to see how Activision adds to Microsoft’s set of gaming tools and ends up impacting the business and the bottom-line.

A UBS analyst, though, said Microsoft stock should be worth $400 in his recent research note as Invezz reported here. MSFT is already up over 40% for the year at writing.