(Reuters) - Chinese food delivery giant Meituan (3690.HK) posted on Friday a bigger-than-expected 22.6% rise in quarterly revenue, defying a slowing Chinese economy.
Meituan - which has an app that provides services ranging from bike-sharing to ticket-booking and maps - reported revenue in the quarter to Dec. 31 of 73.7 billion yuan ($10.20 billion), versus 60.13 billion yuan in the same period a year earlier.
The result compared with the 72.46 billion yuan average of analyst estimates compiled by LSEG.
Its net profit for the fourth quarter hit 2.2 billion yuan, from a loss of 1.08 billion yuan a year earlier.
The turn to profit was mainly attributed to an increase in operating profit from the core local commerce division and a narrowing of operating losses in its new initiatives segment, the company said in a statement.
Meituan CEO Wang Xing had previously flagged that deliveries may have declined in the fourth quarter compared with the same quarter in 2022, which was still affected by COVID-19 containment measures in China, leading to a high volume of orders.
The company's board authorised up to $1 billion in share buybacks beginning Dec. 1.
China's post-pandemic recovery has remained lacklustre, giving rise to a trend that has seen low-cost and discounted products become the focus for platforms and shoppers alike.
Revenue from core local commerce, which includes food delivery and non-food delivery service Meituan Instashopping, rose 26.8% year-over-year to 55.1 billion yuan.
Sales from new initiatives grew by 11.5% year-over-year to 18.6 billion yuan.
Meituan remains China's biggest delivery platform, with a 69% share of the 1 trillion yuan market, according to data from researcher ChinaIRN.
Meituan's hotel booking and travel sector business was buoyed by a "strong industry rebound" with the value of domestic hotel bookings on its platform rising by 100% for the full-year 2023, the company said in its earnings report.
Last year, Meituan announced it was buying Light Year, an artificial intelligence (AI) startup established by Meituan co-founder Wang Huiwen, for $281 million, as major tech firms in China increase their bets on AI.
Last May, Meituan expanded to Hong Kong with new food delivery business KeeTa. The business marks Meituan's first foray outside of mainland China and is expected to be a stepping stone to further international expansion.
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