NHN’s Revenue Increased by 6.4% Year-on-Year to 608.4 Billion KRW
Operating Loss of 113.4 Billion KRW, Turning Deficit Compared to Previous Year
NHN reported its highest-ever quarterly revenue of 608.4 billion KRW in the third quarter. However, it faced an operating loss of 113.4 billion KRW due to unrecovered bonds from Tmon and Weme, turning to a deficit compared to the previous year.
On the 12th, NHN announced these provisional third-quarter earnings. The consolidated revenue increased by 6.4% year-on-year and by 1.5% compared to the previous quarter, with growth across all business segments such as games, payments & advertising, and technology.
However, the operating loss was impacted by a one-time bad debt expense due to the Tmon incident, amounting to a loss of 113.4 billion KRW. Excluding this, the third-quarter operating profit would have been 27.3 billion KRW, marking a 16.8% increase from a year ago.
In the third quarter, the game segment revenue was 112.5 billion KRW, rising by 2.1% year-on-year and 5.7% from the previous quarter. Strong performance in events like the 5th anniversary of the mobile game ‘Hangame Poker Classic’, and the Chuseok holiday contributed to an 8.1% increase in overall web board game revenue. New monthly user numbers for ‘Hangame Poker Classic’ more than doubled year-on-year, and it achieved a record-high 7th position in revenue on Google Play Store on October 8th.
The payment and advertising sector saw a year-on-year increase of 10.3% to 292.6 billion KRW, although it decreased by 1.1% quarter-on-quarter, driven by the ongoing growth in transaction volumes at domestic and international merchants of NHN KCP. NHN Payco’s corporate welfare solutions business saw a 31% year-on-year increase in transaction amounts for the third quarter. In October, the introduction of Starbucks as a new meal voucher merchant was a part of its service expansion.
Revenues from the commerce segment reached 61 billion KRW, a 0.5% increase from a year ago and a 6.2% rise from the previous quarter, attributed to the expansion of brand collaborations in China. Revenue for the technology segment was 102.7 billion KRW, up 7.6% year-on-year and 4.7% from the previous quarter. NHN Cloud’s revenue rose by 22.5% year-on-year due to contributions from its cloud-native consulting business. NHN Dooray also saw a two-digit growth rate in public sector revenue year-on-year and quarter-on-quarter.
Content revenue increased by 1.0% year-on-year to 50.5 billion KRW, though it decreased by 5.3% from the previous quarter. NHN Link’s sports and performance revenues grew evenly, achieving a 33% increase from a year ago.