Tencent profit surges 89% on gaming boom
It is, among other things, the world’s largest gaming firm by revenue.
And right now Tencent probably feels that’s a happy place to be.
The Chinese tech giant on Thursday (November 12) posted a quarterly profit of 5.8 billion dollars - that was 89% up, and well ahead of analyst forecasts.
It was boosted by strong demand for games, including its blockbuster ‘Honor of Kings’.
The title recorded 100 million daily active users in the first 10 months of 2020.
Tencent also operates China’s ubiquitous WeChat app.
And it saw a return to normality in advertising following the spring lockdowns, with rapid growth in sectors including education, internet services and e-commerce.
Its shares closed up by just over 4.7%, defying a down day for Hong Kong’s Hang Seng index.
That helped recover from a plunge the day before, after Beijing published draft antimonopoly rules.
The proposals wiped hundreds of billions of dollars off tech giants including Tencent and e-commerce titan Alibaba.
China has also moved to toughen oversight of online lending - a market served by Tencent’s WeBank service.
However, analysts say the firm’s lending policies are generally seen as prudent, and more in line with regulations than some rivals.
Tencent said revenue from some business units had been hit by this year’s events, which hampered new projects and contract signing.
But it said the hit to revenue would be temporary.
