Sony has announced that it is selling all of the shares it currently holds in Square Enix.

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Sony has owned around 9.5 million Square Enix shares for a decade, making it the publisher's third-largest shareholder - but it will now be selling them to a global firm called SMBC Nikko Securities.According to the Wall Street Journal , the stock will book a Y4.8 billion (nearly US$47 million) one-off profit for the fiscal quarter ending in June; the exact price for which the shares sell will be revealed on Thursday.The expected sale price is significantly lower than the Y16 billion (nearly US$157 million) that the shares are currently worth, according to their current market value.Exclusive Square Enix titles such as earlier Final Fantasy games and the Kingdom Hearts series launched exclusively on PlayStation consoles, but in 2008, the publisher broke that trend by releasing Final Fantasy 13 on Xbox 360 as well as PS3.

Katie Williams is a freelance writer and games journalist. She tweets at @desensitisation and hopes that one day, a bird will tweet back.