*** NTES ($40-$45-$41) quarterly profit doubles, stock up
Tuesday February 17, 8:24 pm ET
(Recasts, background, updates stock activity)
SAN FRANCISCO, Feb 17 (Reuters) - Chinese Internet media firm NetEase.com Inc. (NasdaqNM:NTES - News) on Tuesday said its quarterly net profit doubled, as revenue from online games, advertising and mobile phone text messaging rose.
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NetEase shares, which had closed at $41.30, rose to $44.48 in after-hours trade after the results were reported.
NetEase posted a fourth-quarter net profit of $11.4 million (94.1 million Renminbi), or 36 cents per basic American Depositary Share. Its year-earlier net profit was $5.2 million (RMB 43.1 million).
Revenue rose to $19.5 million (RMB 161.8 million) from $11 million (RMB 90.9 million) a year ago, led by growth in its online game division.
The Beijing-based company said it had 167 million accumulated registered accounts as if Dec. 31, up from 95.7 million the year-earlier.
NetEase, along with rivals Sina.com (NasdaqNM:SINA - News) and Sohu.com (NasdaqNM:SOHU - News), saw its stock price jump several hundred percent in 2003 as the number of Internet surfers in China grew to nearly 80 million people.
Earlier this month, each of the three companies saw their share prices dip after Sohu reported slower-than-expected fourth-quarter growth.
NetEase, whose founder William Ding was ranked China's richest person in 2003 by Forbes magazine, has aggressively developed online games in an effort to distinguish the company from its peers. Nevertheless, it is starting to see competition from privately-held Internet upstarts that are attempting to nibble away at its core business.
Online gaming giant Shanda Networking, which is eyeing a Nasdaq listing in the first quarter of 2004, also has expanded its offerings to encroach on businesses previously held by more established Internet media firms.
1 USD = RMB 8.2767 (Additional reporting by Juliana Liu in Beijing) |
