Livestreaming continues to be the biggest revenue source for the video-based Chinese social media company Joyy, which derived nearly all of its first-quarter revenue from this business.

In the three months through March, revenue generated from livestreaming nearly doubled from a year earlier to $614.1 million, accounting for approximately 95% of total revenue, which jumped 88% year-on-year, according to the earnings report Joyy released Thursday.

The company attributed the strong livestreaming revenue growth to the expanded paying user bases and enhanced monetization capabilities for Bigo Live and Likee, a TikTok-like short video app.

The total number of paying users for Bigo Live, Likee and video communication app Imo increased by 72% year-on-year in the first quarter to 1.67 million, the financial report said. It did not break down paying user figures for each app separately. Apart from the three apps, Joyy also operates social gaming app Hago.

During the three-month period, monthly active users (MAUs) for Bigo Live reached 29.1 million, compared with a year ago when the figure stood at 26.7 million, while Likee and Hago’s MAUs fell 12.6% and 57.7% to 115 million and 13.1 million, respectively.

Joyy’s net loss widened to $87.3 million from $62.3 million in the same quarter of last year.

Joyy’s Nasdaq-listed shares closed up 0.53% at $85.40 on Thursday.

In February, Joyy said in a stock filing that it had completed its sale of livestreaming service YY Live to Baidu, which sees livestreaming as key to its efforts to diversify its revenue base as the Covid-19 pandemic has presented more moneymaking opportunities in the booming business.

The acquisition deal was initially announced on November 16, 2020. Two days later, U.S. short seller Muddy Waters issued a report accusing YY Live of falsifying revenue and user numbers, an allegation Joyy denied.

Contact reporter Ding Yi (yiding@caixin.com)

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