By Dhirendra Tripathi
Investing.com – Roblox stock (NYSE:RBLX) tumbled 16% as its fourth-quarter numbers disappointed, reflecting slowing growth at the gaming platform.
The platform gained popularity in the last two years as home-stuck players used its tools to create their own games and play with others. With most of its users in the 9-12 age group, the return to school for many, and lifting of restrictions, means the platform is now in far less use.
“Specifically, users, engagement hours, payers, and bookings, are all at (or near) all-time high levels, but growth rates have declined as we are comparing, in some cases, to quarters last year in which certain key metrics doubled or even nearly tripled,” CEO and Founder, David Baszucki said in a letter to shareholders.
The results mark Roblox’s first full-year disclosures since it listed in March 2021.
Growth in both bookings and daily active users fell short of expectations.
Bookings refer to Roblox's virtual currency ‘Robux’ that players buy to upgrade their avatars by buying in-game items such as clothing, pets, collectibles or accessories. They rose 20% to $770 million.
Average daily active users rose by a third year-on-year to almost 50 million.
Overall, fourth-quarter revenue jumped 83% to $569 million. Adjusted loss per share was 25 cents and wider than expected.
The company gave some numbers for January as well. DAUs rose 32% to near 55 million, with revenue seen between $203 million and $206 million. Bookings growth was up 2%-4% from a year earlier.