Value of social game company Zynga? Perhaps more than $3 billion

Need another sign that social games are big business? A new report suggests that Zynga, the publisher of games such as FarmVille and Mafia Wars could be worth more than $3 billion — more than half the market capitalization of Electronic Arts ($5.4 billion).

Other notes from the report:

– Only 2% or 3% of users spend money on Zynga games and less than 1% consistently purchase virtual goods. Zynga makes nearly 40% of its revenue from those sales. Other revenue sources include in-game advertisements and marketing offers.

– Upcoming Facebook changes could affect Zynga’s apps. Next month, Facebook is expected to adjust its notification policy for games, something that could “affect Zynga in unintended ways.” The report notes a Facebook change in July 2008 that turned off viral components for the Super Wall application. As a result, average daily users fell from 2.4 million to 0.6 million in a month. Currently, Super Wall users number 0.3 million average daily users.

Read the full article at USA Today’s Game Hunters