The firm, which is the largest video game company in the world, and also the operator of WeChat, saw its revenue grow by 11 percent year on year to 172.4 billion yuan (US$23.83 billion) for the quarter ending in December.
That was much higher compared with the 168.9 billion yuan expected by the market.
Net profit, meanwhile, was up 90 percent year on year to 51.3 billion yuan during the three month period, also higher than the expected 46.03 billion yuan.
The growth came as its gaming business regained momentum and showed robust recovery since mid-2024, with its domestic gaming revenue rising by 23 percent year on year to 33.2 billion yuan and its global gaming revenue climbing 15 percent to 16 billion yuan.
Tencent said the increases were due to a low base from the previous year, as well as growth in some of its hit games including “Honour of Kings” and “Peacekeeper Elite”.
Successful launches of its new games such as “Dungeon & Fighter Mobile” and “Delta Force” as well as regulatory easing over the nation’s gaming sector also helped bolster its growth, it added.
For the full year of 2024, the Shenzhen-headquartered firm registered a profit growth of 68 percent year on year to 194 billion yuan, while revenue grew by eight percent year on year to 660 billion yuan, meeting market expectations.
The firm also attributed artificial intelligence technology as a driving force to improve its various products.
“Starting a few months ago, we have reorganised our AI teams to sharpen focus on both fast product innovation and deep model research, increased our AI-related capital expenditures, and increased our R&D and marketing efforts for our AI-native products,” Tencent said in its earnings statement.
“We believe these stepped-up investments will generate ongoing returns via uplifting productivity in our advertising business and longevity of our games, as well as longer term value from accelerated consumer usage of our AI applications and enterprise adoption of our AI services,” the firm added.
The company proposed a final dividend of HK$4.5 per share for the year, marking a 32 percent rise from a year earlier.
