NAVER Posts KRW 2.4 Trillion in Revenue, KRW 550.6 Billion in Adjusted EBITDA, and KRW 380.2 Billion in Operating Profit
NAVER Posts KRW 2.4 Trillion in Revenue, KRW 550.6 Billion in Adjusted EBITDA, and KRW 380.2 Billion in Operating Profit
NAVER Posts KRW 2.4 Trillion in Revenue, KRW 550.6 Billion in Adjusted EBITDA, and KRW 380.2 Billion in Operating Profit for Q3 2023
- Significant growth in key business sectors such as commerce, fintech, and content... adjusted EBITDA records YoY growth of 19%, marking an all-time high
- Announcing its first Middle East initiative with digital twin technology, NAVER demonstrates global competitiveness in building future cities
November 3, 2023
NAVER Corporation (CEO Choi Soo-yeon) announced that the company recorded KRW 2.4 trillion in revenue, KRW 550.6 billion in adjusted EBITDA, KRW 380.2 billion in operating profit, and KRW 356.2 billion in net profit for the third quarter of 2023.
The consolidated operating revenue for the third quarter increased 18.9% year-over-year (YoY) and 1.6% quarter-over-quarter (QoQ) to KRW 2.4453 trillion. The adjusted earnings before interest, taxes, depreciation, and amortization (EBITDA) reached an all-time high, rising 18.7% YoY and 6.9% QoQ to KRW 550.6 billion, thanks to efforts to strengthen the cost structure. The consolidated operating profit rose by 15.1% YoY and 2.0% QoQ to KRW 380.2 billion.
Revenue by business segment stood at KRW 898.5 billion for the Search Platform, KRW 647.4 billion for Commerce, KRW 340.8 billion for Fintech, KRW 434.9 billion for Content, and KRW 123.6 billion for Cloud.
▶ The Search Platform revenue recorded KRW 898.5 billion, rising 0.3% YoY and declining 1.3% QoQ. Search ads increased 3.5% YoY, establishing NAVER as the only company among the world’s leading advertising platforms to exhibit consistent quarterly growth throughout the endemic. NAVER continues to enhance the platform with the overhaul of the NAVER app, and expand premium offerings in the fourth quarter.
▶ Commerce saw a 41.3% rise YoY and a 2.3% rise QoQ to KRW 647.6 billion in revenue. Even when setting aside the effect of acquiring Poshmark, there was still a notable growth of 14.7% YoY, exceeding the average growth rate of the local commerce sector. Brokerage and sales revenue more than doubled compared to the third quarter of last year because of the inclusion of Poshmark and the expansion of transactions from Brand Stores, Travel, and KREAM.
▶ Fintech marked KRW 340.8 billion in revenue, reflecting a 15.1% YoY increase and a 0.3% increase QoQ. NAVER Pay transactions in the third quarter amounted to KRW 15.2 trillion, up 22.5% YoY and 4.4% QoQ. External transactions grew by 45.8% YoY, and offline transactions doubled to KRW 1.7 trillion compared to last year, driven by the integration of Samsung Pay’s Magnetic Secure Transmission (MST) payment feature and the growth in Booking and Order payments.
▶ The Content sector registered a 39.5% increase YoY and a 3.5% increase QoQ to KRW 434.9 billion. The global transaction volume for WEBTOON climbed 5% YoY and 9% QoQ to KRW 479.4 billion. This is attributable to the successful WEBTOON intellectual property (IP) adaptations and the enhancement of artificial intelligence (AI) recommendations, improving user engagement. The Japanese WEBTOON segment sustained its upward transaction trends because of an increase in original and serialized works. SNOW also saw growth of more than 36.1% YoY, spurred by the popularity of new features like AI-generated profiles and EPIK’s AI Yearbook.
▶ Cloud revenue was KRW 123.6 billion, up 30.3% YoY and 18.3% QoQ. The change in revenue recognition for the NAVER Cloud Platform and an increase in the number of paid accounts for LINE WORKS led to a 19.9% YoY and 11.4% QoQ growth in business-to-business (B2B) revenue. In a separate development, NAVER announced its plans to construct a digital twin platform project for the Saudi Arabian Ministry of Municipal, Rural Affairs and Housing in October.
NAVER CEO Choi Soo-yeon said, “In the third quarter, we unveiled our suite of generative AI services and the roadmap for their monetization, defining our AI business’s future trajectory and laying the groundwork for sustained expansion across various sectors. Moreover, with our recent undertaking of the digital twin technology project in Saudi Arabia, NAVER is accelerating its global ventures, not only in service offerings but also by utilizing our accumulated technological expertise.”
NAVER also became the first global information technology (IT) company to float a samurai bond. It marks the first debut samurai bond in seven years issued by a Korean private sector company outside the financial industry without external guarantees. Also, according to the shareholder return policy announced earlier this year, NAVER allocated a total cash dividend of KRW 62.4 billion on August 22. In addition, the company plans to retire 1% of its treasury stock(which is 1% of the total issued shares) on November 7, valued at around KRW 305.3 billion based on the October 30 closing price.
[Table] NAVER Corporation’s Q3 2023 Performance
