Home > Business > Industry

Naver's Q4 net profit up 48.8% on strong search and e-commerce sales

Published: 07 Feb. 2025, 09:06 Updated: 07 Feb. 2025, 09:35

Naver's headquarters in Gyeonggi [YONHAP]

Naver, Korea's leading internet portal operator, said Friday its fourth-quarter net profit jumped nearly 50 percent from a year earlier thanks to robust sales from its search and e-commerce business.

Net profit for the three months ending in December totaled 444.1 billion won ($306.6 million), up 48.8 percent from 298.4 billion won a year earlier, the company said in a regulatory filing.

Its operating profit for the period rose 33.7 percent on year to 542 billion won. Sales increased 13.7 percent to 2.88 trillion won.

The earnings exceeded market expectations. The average estimate of net profit by analysts stood at 415.6 billion won, according to a survey by Yonhap Infomax, the financial data firm of Yonhap News Agency.

Naver attributed the strong performance to improved sales for its businesses.

Its mainstay search platform unit saw its sales grow 14.7 percent on year to 1.06 trillion won amid efforts to strengthen the competitiveness of its platform.

Sales from the commerce unit rose 17.4 percent on year to 775.1 billion won, and revenue from the financial technology unit improved 12.6 percent to 400.9 billion won.

The content unit saw its revenue inch up 0.2 percent to 467.3 billion won and sales from the cloud business jump 41.1 percent to 177.6 billion won.

For all of 2024, Naver's net income soared 89 percent on year to 1.86 trillion won, and operating profit surged 32.9 percent to 1.97 trillion won.

Annual sales increased 11 percent to 10.73 trillion won in 2024.

Yonhap