Computer games ban costs Tencent 52 billion euros

On By Garmin Philip

The stricter regulation of the Chinese Internet giants has taken the wind out of the sails of the technology group Tencent. Sales rose in the third quarter by 13 percent to 142.4 billion yuan (19.24 billion euros), as the video game provider and operator of the messenger app WeChat announced. The growth was, however, as low as since the IPO in 2004.

The communist government in Beijing has tightened the reins massively in the entertainment industry in recent months. For example, the authorities – krone.at reported – limited the time that under-18s are allowed to spend online games to three hours a week. New computer games have not been released since the summer. Tencent’s market value had then collapsed by $ 60 billion (51.83 billion euros), the shares have not recovered. Tencent increased its sales in the past quarter with mobile games by nine percent. Net income rose three percent to 39.5 billion yuan. Analysts polled by data provider Refinitiv had expected earnings to decline. “We are proactively adopting the new regulatory environment and believe that it can contribute to more sustainable development in the industry,” said Tencent CEO Pony Ma. The group believes that some of the government’s regulatory restrictions are temporary.

Reference-www.krone.at