Meituan swings to 8b yuan profit, NetEase's rises 54pc

Meituan (3690) swung to a net profit of 8.05 billion yuan (HK$8.67 billion) in the first six months of the year from a loss of 6.8 billion yuan a year ago.

The Chinese food delivery giant's revenue for the period rose 30.2 percent to 126.58 billion yuan, slightly above estimates.

For the second quarter alone, the adjusted net income surged by 272 percent to a record 7.66 billion yuan, far more than a projection of 4.5 billion yuan.

Sales soared by the most since 2021 at 33.4 percent to 67.96 billion yuan, against an expectation of 67.2 billion yuan, the company said yesterday.

Revenue from core local commerce, including food delivery, increased by 39.2 percent to 51.2 billion yuan in the quarter, which led to a 34.5 percent rise in operating profit for the segment.

During the quarter, the number of on-demand delivery transactions grew by 31.6 percent from the previous year, while the figure of newly onboarded merchants more than doubled.

The gross transaction volume of its in-store, hotel and travel business also climbed by over 120 percent as offline consumption continued to recover, Meituan said.

Sales from its new initiatives business were up by 18.4 percent to 16.8 billion yuan in the three months through June, while operating loss fell by 23.5 percent to 5.2 billion yuan.

Its shares gained by 7.4 percent before the results.

NetEase (9999), meanwhile, saw its earnings jump 54.8 percent to nearly 15 billion yuan in the first six months from a year ago.

The Chinese video game developer recorded a 5 percent rise in net revenue to 49 billion yuan in the first half and declared a quarterly dividend of 10.5 US cents (81.9 HK cents).

In the June quarter, NetEase's earnings gained by 56 percent to 8.24 billion yuan. Net sales rose by 3.7 percent to 24 billion yuan but missed an estimate of 24.8 billion yuan. Among them, net sales from games and related value-added services climbed by 3.6 percent to 18.8 billion yuan, versus 19.53 billion yuan expected.

Its music arm Cloud Music (9899) posted an interim net profit of 293.8 million yuan from a loss of 270.8 million yuan a year ago, but its net revenue dropped by 11.1 percent to 1.9 billion yuan.

Net sales of Youdao were at 1.2 billion yuan, up by 26.2 percent year-on-year.

Separately, Ping An Healthcare and Technology (1833) narrowed its interim net loss by 47.1 percent to 244.6 million yuan, thanks to the revenue growth of its high profitability business, optimization of resources allocation, as well as digital operation efficiency.

But the overall revenue slumped by 21.5 percent to 2.2 billion yuan due to a decline in revenue from the business with low strategic synergies, and a change in operating models of some businesses, the company said. Still, the firm said it has confidence in breaking even before 2025.