Naver Q4 net profit up 129% thanks to commerce, fintech and webtoons

Naver's headquarters in Seongnam, Gyeonggi [NEWS1]

Korean tech giant Naver logged 301.8 billion won ($226.6 million) in fourth-quarter net profit, up 129 percent from the same period the previous year, driven primarily by robust growth in commerce and fintech.

Naver's operating profit for the October-December period was 405.5 billion won, up 20.5 percent on-year, according to the company's regulatory filing Friday.

Sales rose 11.7 percent on-year to 2.53 trillion won.

For the whole of 2023, Naver's net income reached 988.4 billion won, up 46.8 percent from the previous year.

The annual operating profit rose 14.1 percent on-year to 1.49 trillion won, and revenue gained 17.6 percent to 9.67 trillion won.

Naver said its major businesses delivered a strong overall performance in the fourth quarter.

Its flagship search platform division saw sales rise 1.3 percent on-year to 928.3 billion won, thanks to continued high demand for search advertisements.

Sales for its commerce division soared 35.7 percent to 660.5 billion won as the value of total transactions on its smart store platform increased 11 percent on-year to 12.4 trillion won in the October-December period.

Naver's social commerce platforms — Poshmark and Kream — also contributed to the brisk sales from commerce.

Sales of its fintech division also increased 11.3 percent to 356 billion won, thanks to a 23.9 percent jump in the value of quarterly transactions in the fourth quarter.

The content division also saw sales advance 6.6 percent on-year to 466.3 billion won, powered by the growth of its webtoon business and strong sales of its mobile camera application, Snow.

Transactions on the global webtoon platform, in particular, grew 9.3 percent on-year to 444 billion won, according to the company.

The cloud division saw its sales grow 13.3 percent on-year to 125.9 billion won.

Naver CEO Choi Soo-yeon said the company has worked to increase its profitability in 2023 and will focus on strengthening its competitiveness in core businesses with artificial intelligence and data technologies this year.

BY SEO JI-EUN, YONHAP [seo.jieun1@joongang.co.kr]