Weibo Beats Q1 Revenue And EPS Estimates Despite Yearly Decline - What's On The Cards?

Weibo Corp (NASDAQ: WB) reported a fiscal first-quarter 2024 revenue decline of 4% year-on-year to $395.5 million, beating the analyst consensus estimate of $392.5 million. Revenue of the Chinese social network company was flat Y/Y on a CC basis.

Adjusted EPS of $0.41 beat the analyst consensus estimate of $0.36. The stock price gained after the results.

Weibo’s advertising and marketing revenues declined by 5% Y/Y at $339.0 million. Value-added service (VAS) revenues decreased 3% Y/Y to $56.5 million.

Monthly active users (MAUs) were 588 million in March 2024 (vs 593 million Y/Y), while Average daily active users (DAUs) rose by 5 million Y/Y to 255 million (vs 255 million Y/Y). 

The adjusted operating margin improved by 100 bps to 32% as profits declined by 2.2% Y/Y. 

Weibo held $3.3 billion in cash and equivalents as of March-end and generated $139.6 million in operating cash flow during the quarter.

CEO Gaofei Wang said, “On the user front, we focused on the acquisition and engagement of high quality users and improving ROI of our channel investments. On the content front, we also made progress in optimizing traffic structure through continuous execution of vertical content strategy. On the monetization front, Weibo’s business demonstrated stabilized trend, with enhanced operating efficiency this quarter.”

Weibo stock lost 46% in the last 12 months. Investors can gain exposure to the stock via IShares MSCI China Small-Cap ETF ECNS and Fidelity Metaverse ETF FMET.

Price Action: WB shares traded higher by 2.71% at $9.10 premarket at the last check Thursday.

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