The Mail.Ru Group holding decreased its annual profit in 2015 for the first time since its IPO on the London Stock Exchange in 2010. Yandex also reflected negative dynamics in its reporting earlier.

Photo: Ekaterina Kuzmina / RBC

The Internet holding Mail.Ru Group in 2015 compared to 2014 decreased its net profit by 13.6% - from 11.5 billion to 9.9 billion rubles, as follows from the company’s financial report for 2015. Thus, Mail.Ru Group's annual profit decreased for the first time since the company entered the London Stock Exchange in the fall of 2010. In the report, Mail.Ru Group provides financial indicators without taking into account the recruitment portal Headhunter, which the holding sold in February 2016 for 10 billion rubles. a group of investors led by the Elbrus Capital fund . Together with Headhunter, the company’s net profit in 2015 fell by 11.5%, to 11.1 billion rubles, as follows from the preliminary results of Mail.Ru Group.

Mail.Ru Group's revenue excluding Headhunter at the end of 2015 grew by 11%, to RUB 36.3 billion. Of the segments, revenue from mobile advertising grew most actively during the reporting period (it accounts for 40.3% of the holding’s revenue) - by 19.4%, to 14.6 billion rubles. Mail.Ru Group's revenues from mobile games (almost 25% of the revenue structure) in 2015 increased by 6.3%, to almost 9 billion rubles, from in-app purchases and games (34.4% of total revenues) - by 5.4%, to 12.5 billion rubles.

The fastest growing asset in the Mail.Ru Group portfolio remains the social network VKontakte - 2015 was the first year when the holding fully consolidated the social network’s finances in its reporting. VKontakte's revenue over the past year grew by 44.2%, to 6.23 billion rubles, Mail.Ru Group reported at the end of February in preliminary results.

At the end of 2016, Mail.Ru Group expects revenue growth by 8–14%, EBITDA margin by 47–49%, said Dmitry Grishin, CEO of the holding.

The economic crisis and the contraction of the advertising market affected not only the Mail.Ru Group business. The second largest Russian Internet company, Yandex, also showed a decrease in annual profit in 2015 compared to 2014 for the first time since entering the stock exchange. Yandex held an IPO on NASDAQ in the spring of 2011. The company's net profit in 2015 decreased by 43%, to 9.7 billion rubles. (for adjusted net profit - an indicator cleared of “paper” and currency factors - by 11%, to 12.2 billion rubles). The main foreign currency expenses for both companies are rent, salaries and marketing promotion. Yandex's revenue in 2015 increased by 18% compared to 2014, to 59.8 billion rubles.

Mail.Ru Group's profit fell for the first time since its IPO