[Click eStock] The 'First Year' of Naver's Growth... Expected to Surpass 7 Trillion KRW in Revenue and 1 Trillion KRW in Operating Profit

"Year of Full-Scale Growth for Major Services like Fintech and Webtoons"

[Asia Economy Reporter Minwoo Lee] This year, Naver is expected to surpass 7 trillion won in sales and 1 trillion won in operating profit. This is because major services, including the existing largest revenue source, the advertising business, as well as fintech (technology + finance) and content businesses such as webtoons, are expected to show significant growth.

According to Korea Investment & Securities on the 6th, Naver is projected to record sales of 1.8 trillion won and operating profit of 227.4 billion won in the fourth quarter of last year. These figures represent increases of 16.9% and 6.6%, respectively, compared to the previous year. The business platform segment, which is the cloud business division, is also estimated to achieve sales of 752.7 billion won, up 14.3% year-on-year. Content segment sales are expected to reach 55.6 billion won, a 73.7% increase year-on-year, driven by the continued high growth of Naver Webtoon.

This growth trend is expected to continue this year as well. Ho-yoon Jung, a researcher at Korea Investment & Securities, explained, "After two years of profit decline, performance improvement will shift to profit increase starting this year," adding, "This is because it is a year in which growth in fintech such as Line Pay and Naver Pay, and webtoon sectors such as Naver Webtoon and Line Manga, will occur simultaneously."

In particular, the uncertainty regarding intensified competition in Line’s fintech business in Japan due to the merger with Yahoo Japan has been largely eliminated, which is also cited as a key reason. It is also noteworthy that the advertising segment of Naver Portal, the main revenue source, continues to maintain a double-digit growth rate.

Korea Investment & Securities forecasts that Naver will achieve sales of 7.585 trillion won and operating profit of 1.07 trillion won this year. The investment opinion is "buy," with a target stock price of 210,000 won. The closing price on the 3rd was 181,500 won.

This content was produced with the assistance of AI translation services.