腾讯创下七年最快增长速度

中国互联网巨头腾讯公布了七年内最快的收入增长速度，利润也创下新高，超出预期35%，主要得益于其招牌砍杀游戏《王者荣耀》。

投资者认为，2017年，腾讯最为大胆的部分投资终将取得成功，使腾讯成为全球估值最高的公司之一。《王者荣耀》和其他热门手机游戏约2亿用户的消费能力，使手机游戏的收入首次超过了台式机游戏。信息应用微信上刚刚起步的广告和理财业务，也让投资者相信，腾讯终将成为可与行业领袖阿里巴巴集团（比肩的广告巨头。

RHB Research Institute驻香港的分析师李玉洁（音译）表示：“得益于《王者荣耀》等游戏的增长，腾讯手机游戏收入增长迅速。广告收入也超出了我们的预期，保持了健康的增长速度。”

今年，腾讯股价已经上涨了70%，而在纽约上市的阿里巴巴股价上涨了80%。腾讯的业绩公布后，持有腾讯约三分之一股份的南非报业股价上涨了4.4%，创下了七个月内的最大日内涨幅。腾讯公布业绩的当天，有消息称腾讯和其他多家公司在中国第二大无线运营商投资了110亿元，这一系列战略合作将为建设全国高速5G网络提供资金。

这笔投资或将促进腾讯朝着实现其促进互联网应用的终极目标更进一步，但不会直接影响腾讯整合社交媒体与游戏业务的经营方式。《王者荣耀》用户可以在微信上讨论游戏策略，邀请新朋友，共同在游戏中争夺更多荣誉。据称，腾讯将把这款游戏推向其他市场，包括美国市场，而且《王者荣耀》的女玩家比例，是所有硬核游戏或战术竞技游戏中最高的。

在《王者荣耀》日益火爆的同时，腾讯还推出了更多游戏，包括《魂斗罗：归来》。许多中国玩家小时候都曾玩过这款由科乐美开发的游戏，腾讯希望通过这款游戏唤起中国玩家的怀旧之情。腾讯通过微信和QQ向十多亿用户发行游戏，使手机游戏收入在本季度大幅增长了54%。

在截至6月份的3个月内，腾讯净收入增长了70%，达到182亿元（27亿美元），远超过外界估算的平均水平135亿元。不过一大部分收入来自腾讯投资的初创公司股指上涨。腾讯在金融技术到共享单车等领域共投资了超过50亿元，其中包括独角兽公司摩拜单车。公司同期销售额增长59%，达到566亿元，也超出了预期。

腾讯并未解释其收入的增加得益于哪些公司的市值增长（腾讯将该笔收入计入“其他收益”）。但腾讯持有微众银行的股份。微众银行通过微信平台销售货币市场基金。另外，有报道称，腾讯投资的众安在线财产保险股份有限公司可能在香港进行首次公开募股。另外，网石游戏的IPO也让腾讯大赚一笔。这是过去七年韩国规模最大的一次IPO。

而腾讯的利润增长来源却完全不同：“牛虻”战术

腾讯总裁刘炽平在电话会议中告诉分析师，其刚刚起步的支付与云业务在该季度实现了三位数的增长速度。这两项业务是阿里巴巴和蚂蚁金服的直接竞争对手。

网络游戏和信息等增值服务的收入增长了43%，达到368亿元。在线广告收入增长55%，达到101亿元。微信的月活跃用户达到9.63亿，较前一年增长了19.5%。但腾讯的另外一个支柱社交网络QQ手机版用户数量，截至季度末却减少了3.9%。

销售和市场营销支出增加了55%至37亿元，总体成本增长了54%，因为腾讯增加了对内容和人才的支出，并加大了对人工智能和技术研发的投入。刘炽平表示，与Netflix类似的视频流媒体部门实现盈利“仍需要一些时间”。

在此次业绩发布之前，摩根士丹利驻香港分析师陈星嘉和他的团队在一篇报告中写道：“腾讯现有的游戏与渠道将继续吸引新玩家，带来更多收入。”他们还预测“腾讯在效果广告领域有巨大的增长潜力，支付业务的收入也将大幅增长”。（财富中文网）

译者：刘进龙/汪皓

The Chinese internet giant posted its fastest revenue growth in seven years and a record profit that surpassed estimates by 35%, thanks to its marquee hack-and-slash title Honour of Kings.

Investors bet in 2017 that some of the company’s boldest investments would finally pan out, creating one of the world’s most richly valued companies in the process. It tapped the spending power of some 200 million players of Honour of Kings and other phone hits, helping mobile games revenue surpass that of desktops for the first time. The still-nascent advertising and finance business on messaging app WeChat has also boosted confidence it can eventually become an ad powerhouse alongside leader Alibaba Group.

“Mobile games revenue grew fast, benefiting from titles like Honour of Kings,” said Li Yujie, an analyst with RHB Research Institute in Hong Kong. “Advertising business also topped our expectations and grew at a healthy speed.”

Tencent’s shares have gained 70% this year, compared with an 80% rise for New York-listed Alibaba. Naspers Ltd., which owns about a third of Tencent, gained as much as 4.4% after the results, its biggest gain on an intraday basis in seven months. It reported results the same day news emerged it was investing 11 billion yuan in China’s second-largest wireless carrier alongside a host of other companies, in a series of strategic tie-ups that could bankroll the construction of a nationwide high-speed 5G network.

That investment may further Tencent’s ultimate goal of boosting internet usage but is unlikely to have immediate impact however on Tencent’s business of blending social media and gaming. Honour of Kings allows users on WeChat to discuss strategy, pull in other friends and work together in competing for gaming glory. Tencent is said to be taking the game to new markets, including the U.S., and the title now boasts the highest proportion of female players for a hard-core or battle-arena title.

With Honour of Kings going strong, the company is already adding more titles to its pipeline, including Contra Return, a bid to re-kindle the nostalgia of Chinese users who grew up playing the game developed by Konami. Games distributed to a billion-plus users on WeChat and QQ combined fueled a 54% surge in mobile gaming revenue in the quarter.

Tencent reported a 70% surge in net income to a record 18.2 billion yuan ($2.7 billion) for the three months ended June, exceeding the 13.5 billion-yuan average of estimates. A chunk of that however came from a jump in valuations of more than 5 billion yuan from its investments into startups in fields from financial technology to bike rentals, including unicorn Mobike. Sales rose 59% to 56.6 billion yuan, also topping projections.

While Tencent didn’t elaborate on which companies’ mark-ups helped it boost income -- which it recorded as “other gains” -- the company owns a stake in WeBank, which distributes money-market funds via WeChat. It’s also a backer of Zhongan Online P&C Insurance Co., which is said to be filing for a Hong Kong initial public offering. It also booked a gain from the IPO of Netmarble Games Corp., South Korea’s biggest coming-out party in seven years.

Tencent’s Profit Growth Came from a Very Different Game: Gadfly

Tencent’s nascent payments and cloud businesses -- both of which compete directly with Alibaba and its Ant Financial affiliate -- stood out, both growing by triple-digits in the quarter, President Martin Lau told analysts on a conference call.

Revenue from Value Added Services, which includes online games and messaging, climbed 43% to 36.8 billion yuan. Online advertising sales rose 55%to 10.1 billion yuan. WeChat had 963 million monthly active users, up 19.5% from the previous year. But the mobile version of QQ, Tencent’s other mainstay social network, had 3.9% fewer users at the end of the quarter.

Selling and marketing expenses rose 55% to 3.7 billion yuan, while general costs rose 54%, as Tencent shelled out for content and talent while sinking more money into artificial intelligence and technology research. The Netflix-like video-streaming division will “take quite some time” to become profitable as content costs inflate, Lau said.

“Tencent’s existing games and pipeline continue to draw new gamers and revenue,” Morgan Stanley analysts led by Hong Kong-based Grace Chen wrote in a report ahead of the results release. They also foresee “strong growth potential in performance advertising and surging revenue growth in the payments business.”