Nexon's Q1 2024 Earnings, And MapleStory's, Were Down, But "Stronger Than Expected"

Ever have one of those days where nothing goes your way, but it still could have been so much worse? That's sort of how the Q1 2024 financials for Nexon read as pretty much everything was down, but it wasn't as bad as they expected.

FC Online and FC Moblie continue to do the heavy lifting for Nexon, despite not competing with the strong performance of Q1 2023. In Korea, revenue was down 13% year-over-year, but exceeded Nexon's outlook driven by the higher-than-expected performances of FC Online and FC Mobile. Despite keeping things respectful, FC Online was down year over year compared to Q1 2023.

MapleStory fell slightly below forecast for Q1 2024, but Nexon says "Our strategy of throttling monetization in favor of improving player engagement had a positive impact." I'll let those who play be the judge.

Revenue in China was down a whopping 32% year-over-year, but within Nexon's outlook of ¥29.2 billion. In Korea, Q1 revenue was ¥108.4 billion, down 13% year over year on an as-reported basis. And it wouldn't be a Nexon financial report without mentioning Dave the Diver, which helped revenue in North America and Europe grow 92% year-over-year at ¥9.9 billion. The Finals and MapleStory also helped out the NA EU financials.

For Q2 2024 Nexon is expecting to be in the range of between down 2% and up 11% year-over-year.