Tencent Music Entertainment 4Q Profits Rise; Forms Music Label With Warner Music

   By Adriano Marchese 
 

Tencent Music Entertainment Group on Monday reported a rise in fourth-quarter profit, benefiting from a sharp increase in the number of paying users of its online music in the period, and said it has launched a new joint venture with Warner Music Group Corp.

The Chinese online music entertainment platform said net income was 1.2 billion Chinese yuan ($184.4 million), compared with CNY1.04 billion a year ago.

On a per-share basis, earnings were CNY0.36, compared with CNY0.31 in 2019.

Sales rose 14% to CNY8.34 billion, the company said, benefiting from a 40% increase to 56 million online music paying users year-on-year.

Tencent said that it has agreed to launch a new joint venture record label with Warner Music. The JV is expected to leverage Warner Music's resources and experience in supporting artist careers coupled with Tencent's influence in mainland China's music and entertainment markets.

As well as the JV with Warner Music, Tencent said that it has expanded its existing multi-year strategic licensing agreement under which it will continue to make Warner Music's repertoire available across all its online music platforms.

Write to Adriano Marchese at [e-mail]

(END) Dow Jones Newswires

March 22, 2021 17:05 ET (21:05 GMT)

Copyright (c) 2021 Dow Jones & Company, Inc.