Mr. Henry Sha, Chief Financial Officer of Huya, commented, “During the second quarter, we strategically upgraded our monetization tactics for sustainable longer-term growth. Despite the seasonal impact, Huya still achieved fast growth in both traffic and revenue. Our revenue growth once again exceeded the high end of management guidance range. We are also delighted to achieve better-than-expected profitability in the second quarter amid increased spending in content and marketing, both domestically and globally.Non-GAAP gross margin trended well at 16.9%, up from 16.3% in the second quarter of 2018, benefiting from self-produced content and optimized efficiency in operations.Non-GAAP operating income increased by 104.7% year-over-year withnon-GAAP operating margin at 5.8%, compared with 5.5% in the second quarter of 2018, indicating our ability to invest in the future while continue delivering solid operating results.”
Second Quarter 2019 Financial Results
Total net revenues for the second quarter of 2019 increased by 93.6% to RMB2,010.5 million (US$292.9 million), from RMB1,038.3 million in the same period of 2018.
Live streaming revenues increased by 93.7% to RMB1,921.5 million (US$279.9 million) in the second quarter of 2019, from RMB991.8 million in the same period of 2018, primarily due to the increases in both the number of paying users on Huya’s platform and average spending per paying user. The increase in the number of paying users was primarily driven by the Company’s mobile strategy, diversification of content offerings and continued efforts in converting active users into paying users. The increase in spending per paying user was primarily driven by the enhancement of content attractiveness, the improvement in user experience and upgrade of product features.
Advertising and other revenues increased by 91.3% to RMB89.0 million (US$13.0 million) in the second quarter of 2019, from RMB46.5 million in the same period of 2018. This increase was primarily driven by increased demand from gaming advertisers and further recognition of Huya’s brand name in China’s online advertising market.
Cost of revenuesincreased by 92.1% to RMB1,674.8 million (US$244.0 million) in the second quarter of 2019 from RMB872.0 million in the same period of 2018, primarily attributable to the increase in revenue sharing fees and content costs, bandwidth costs, as well as the increase in headcount of personnel involved in the operations of Company’s platforms.
Revenue sharing fees and content costs increased by 105.0% to RMB1,355.6 million (US$197.5 million) in the second quarter of 2019 from RMB661.2 million in the same period of 2018, primarily due to the increase in virtual item revenue sharing fees which grew at a similar pace with the Company’s live streaming revenue, and continued spending ine-sports content and content creators in both domestic and overseas markets.
Bandwidth costs increased by 21.5% to RMB195.7 million (US$28.5 million) in the second quarter of 2019 from RMB161.0 million in same period of 2018, primarily due to an increase in bandwidth usage as a result of increased user base on Huya’s platforms and enhanced live streaming video quality improvement, partially offset by improved efficiency in bandwidth utilization through continued deployment of new technologies in content distribution.
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