Yandex.Classifieds Sees Yearly Revenues Climb 40% as Russian Market Recovers

The Russian internet giant Yandex has reported on its Q4 and yearly activities including the performance of its online classifieds division known as Yandex.Classifieds which includes real estate portal Yandex Realty and Yandex Rent as well as autos portal Auto.ru.

Revenue for Yandex.Classifieds was up 27% on a quarterly like for like basis and 41% on a whole year basis while Adjusted EBITDA was down 19% on a quarterly basis and up 93% yearly. The segment's Adjusted EBITDA margin for the year was 25%, up 6.8pp on 2020's margin of 18.5%.

The increase in revenue was attributed largely to an improvement in monetization strategies for the autos vertical where revenue grew by 150% over the year.

The decrease in Q4 Adjusted EBITDA meanwhile was chalked up by the company to "increased investments in the development and marketing of new products and services in order to expand our end-to-end value proposition for both customers and consumers, as well as overall enhancement of the Classifieds segment’s offering."

In a letter to shareholders, the company's recent release of Yandex Rent was singled out as an area for growth and is expected to provide competition to a similar product being offered by the vertical market leader Cian which recently went public on the U.S. market. Yandex Rent is described as a service that...

"helps to manage pre-contract rental processes and subsequent administration of the payments. We are seeing good progress: a few months after the launch, we have expanded the service to four cities in Russia and added about 4 thousand apartments to the platform, 50% of which are signed online. Our service provides a 3D apartment tour, insures the risks of both parties to the transaction and supports clients on various issues even after signing a contract"