GameStop stock is soaring today, after the company reported Tuesday that it hit nearly $3 billion in revenue for the all-important holiday sales period. The nine-week holiday sales report was issued at market close yesterday, and GameStop shares opened strong today, January 14, as you can see in the chart above.

At press time, GameStop shares are up close to 11 percent.

For the holiday period, total sales fell 6.7 percent to $2.94 billion. So why are GameStop shares doing to well today? According to Sterne Agee analyst Arvind Bhatia, that's because the downturn in sales was not as severe as previously expected.

Bhatia also points out that, while GameStop's overall sales numbers were down for the period, the company did post gains in areas such as new software, digital, and console sales for December.

"We believe these results bode well for 2015 and should help refute some of the bear thesis on the stock," Bhatia said in a note to investors today.

Another analyst, Colin Sebastian of Robert W. Baird, seemed to agree, saying in his own note to investors that GameStop's holiday sales numbers were actually better than expected.

"Looking ahead, we expect GameStop to show improved momentum throughout the year as the product mix continues to shift from hardware to higher-margin next-gen software," he said.

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