On the evening of March 4th, during a Sohu performance conference call, Zhang Chaoyang, founder, chairman of the board of directors, and CEO of Sohu, talked about the company's advertising revenue outlook and the macroeconomic situation in the second half of this year, stating that the advertising market is declining faster than expected. "This year's Spring Festival is later than last year, and most people are on vacation in the first quarter. Advertisers usually only consider their annual advertising plans after the Spring Festival, so we started contacting advertisers in the past few days."
He also mentioned that generally speaking, the second quarter is a good quarter for advertising revenue, and it will be better than the first quarter, after all, the first quarter is affected by seasonality. Sohu will continue to carry out innovative marketing activities to obtain the budget of advertisers. "We haven't retreated, but are using our funds to fight and increase our user base. In the next year, we will increase our market investment, refine our products, video socializing, live streaming, and UGC (user original content) products."
According to the financial reports released by Sohu for the fourth quarter of 2023 and the fiscal year 2023, Sohu's total revenue in the fourth quarter of last year was $141 million, a year-on-year decrease of 12%. A net loss of $11 million was incurred under non US GAAP accounting standards, compared to a net loss of $2 million in the fourth quarter of the previous year. At the same time, Sohu's board of directors approved an additional amount for the previously announced American Depositary Stock Repurchase Program on March 2, 2024, increasing the total amount from a maximum of $80 million to a maximum of $150 million.