On November 15th, China Network Technology reported (Reporter Li Ting) that the compliance rectification has continuously impacted the performance of Tencent Music (TME. NYSE/01698. HK). The unaudited financial performance report for the third quarter released yesterday showed that the company achieved a revenue of 6.57 billion yuan in Q3, a year-on-year decrease of 11%; The net profit was 1.26 billion yuan, a year-on-year increase of 16%.
From the perspective of revenue structure, the revenue of online music services was 4.55 billion yuan, a year-on-year increase of 33%, mainly due to the accelerated growth of online music subscription revenue and the growth of advertising service revenue. The revenue of social entertainment services and other businesses was 2.02 billion yuan, a significant decrease of 49% year-on-year.
Since the revenue of online music services surpassed that of social entertainment services for the first time in Q2 this year, the former's revenue share has further increased to 69%, while the latter has decreased to 31%. Liang Zhu, CEO of Tencent Music Entertainment Group, stated that the online music business has become the core pillar of the group, continuously attracting user participation and driving profitability improvement, while the social entertainment business is also continuously optimizing.
During the reporting period, both major business MAUs (monthly active user numbers) decreased, with online music service MAUs reaching 594 million, a year-on-year decrease of 4%; The mobile MAU of social entertainment services reached 129 million people, a decrease of 17% compared to the same period last year.
MAU growth has hit a bottleneck, and Tencent Music is attempting to stimulate the growth of the number of paying users and ARPPU (average income per paying user) by expanding its monetization channels.
In June of this year, QQ Music, a subsidiary of Tencent Music, announced that starting from July 4th, the monthly subscription fee for luxury green diamond members increased from 13 yuan to 15 yuan, the seasonal subscription price increased from 35 yuan to 45 yuan, and the annual subscription fee increased from 138 yuan to 158 yuan. The continuous monthly fee for super members is 30 yuan, and the annual fee is 348 yuan. Another product, 'Kuwo Music', has increased its luxury VIP price from 88 yuan to 158 yuan. At the same time, the company has launched the function of "watching advertisements and listening to member songs for free".
The effect of raising membership fees is immediate. The monthly ARPPU of online music services has achieved six consecutive quarters of growth, with a year-on-year increase of 17% in Q3 reaching 10.3 yuan, entering the 10 yuan range for the first time. The number of paid users for online music services was 100 million, a year-on-year increase of 21%.
The monthly ARPPU of social entertainment services was 86.2 yuan, a sharp drop of 51% compared to 177.3 yuan in the same period in 2022. In response, the financial report explained that this is mainly due to the company adjusting some live streaming interactive functions and implementing stricter compliance procedures to improve services and strengthen risk control management.
The gross profit margin of Tencent Music in the third quarter was 35.7%, a year-on-year increase of 3.1 percentage points. The company believes that this is mainly due to the strong growth in revenue from music subscription and advertising services, as well as the gradual increase in original content.
During the reporting period, the company continued to adopt a frugal strategy, and the total operating expenses in Q3 decreased by 12% year-on-year to 1.27 billion yuan. Among them, sales and marketing expenses were 220 million yuan, a year-on-year decrease of 11%; General and administrative expenses were 1.05 billion yuan, a year-on-year decrease of 12%.
As of the end of September, Tencent Music had cash, cash equivalents, and term deposits of 30.96 billion yuan, a slight increase of 1% compared to 30.5 billion yuan as of June 30.