"I'm actually pretty optimistic about the holiday season in the sense that... parents are going to buy toys for their kids come this holiday," Mooney told Reuters in an interview. "In terms of the things they're likely to give up, I would expect us to be pretty far down the list."

In his nine year tenure Mooney has grown a global licensing business to $30 billion of retail sales in 2008 by nurturing brands such as Disney Princess and cross promoting properties from the company's other divisions, like the Pixar film "Cars" and Disney Channel's "High School Musical." Disney generally earns a 10 percent royalty on those sales.

Mooney said the industry and retail sales "will certainly be challenged for this season and the rest of 2009 and I'm pretty confident Disney will gain share" as consumers turn to "value brands."

"By that I don't just mean lower price -- I mean what am I getting from the Walt Disney Co relative to other competitors that are out there," he said.

Because Disney earns a royalty on products it licenses and is paid when orders are delivered to retailers, Mooney said the company had good visibility through the holiday season.

Since retailers, wholesalers and licensees had already committed to holiday products before the financial markets became shaky, rather than canceling or adjusting those orders, most are "just keeping their fingers and toes crossed as we go through the season," he said.

"I really don't think people are going to adjust (orders) until they come out the back end of the holiday season and into the spring," Mooney said.

Mooney did not anticipate "a large scale shift" in orders unless there was "a dramatic slowdown throughout the holiday season in terms of consumer purchasing, which would then back up inventory going into the spring."

"But it's too early in the season to figure out what the consumer is going to do exactly," Mooney said. "Everybody is expecting them to be very selective and very price conscious but it's unclear to what degree."