Dolphin Research
2025.02.20 11:18

$Bilibili(BILI.US) Quick Interpretation: Q4 performance basically met previous guidance and market expectations, mainly benefiting from "Three Kingdoms" and high growth in advertising, achieving positive GAAP net profit for the first time. However, Bilibili's focus here is on the outlook given during the conference call, with the core issue being that advertising may maintain high growth by releasing point loading rates, but this year lacks new games. The new season of "Three Kingdoms" in January has seen a slight decline in revenue compared to the previous season, which may raise some concerns in the market about whether it will return to a one-legged walking state. Therefore, the conference call should focus on the management's strategy for the gaming business.

1. Slow user growth: Q4 daily active users reached 103 million, an increase of less than 3 million year-on-year. Bilibili's user growth has basically plateaued, and the gap with Xiaohongshu's advantages continues to widen.

2. Gaming high growth of 79%, mainly driven by "Three Kingdoms." In Q4, a new game "Jujutsu Kaisen" was launched globally (excluding Japan), but the overall response was average, with monthly revenue expected to be between 100-200 million RMB. However, the revenue scale of "Three Kingdoms" in Q4 is estimated to be 800 million.

Additionally, Q4 deferred revenue decreased by 7% quarter-on-quarter, indicating that revenue is also weakening. Therefore, if there continues to be no new key game reserves, the pressure on gaming growth this year will undoubtedly be significant.

3. Advertising high growth of 24%, benefiting from e-commerce, gaming, and other advertisements. To maintain double-digit growth going forward, either improve advertising ROI efficiency, such as leveraging AI, or release a bit more advertising loading rate.

4. Value-added growth rate continues to slow down, as the number of premium members is increasing, indicating that live streaming is the main drag. Live streaming has passed the low base dividend and is gradually returning to the declining trend of the traditional live streaming industry.

5. Q4 saw a tangible positive profit under GAAP, but it also relies on the indispensable contributions from advertising and gaming (which drive gross margin improvement) and continued slow efficiency improvements (controlling the growth of operating expenses). Therefore, if gaming falters in 2025, margins will continue to fluctuate seasonally.

The copyright of this article belongs to the original author/organization.

The views expressed herein are solely those of the author and do not reflect the stance of the platform. The content is intended for investment reference purposes only and shall not be considered as investment advice. Please contact us if you have any questions or suggestions regarding the content services provided by the platform.