TikTok parent’s revenue grows as AI spending pressures profits

ByteDance’s artificial-intelligence spending pressured profit in the first half of the year, but the TikTok parent’s revenue accelerated as a U.S. regulatory overhang cleared, people familiar with the matter said.

Raffaele Huang( with inputs from The Wall Street Journal)

Revenue rose more than 30% to $120 billion during the period, buoyed by growth in the company’s international advertising, livestreaming and TikTok e-commerce business, the people said. Net profit eased to $20 billion, they added.

Last year, ByteDance posted annual revenue growth of 29% to $200 billion while net profit jumped 27% to $42 billion, the people said.

The topline growth came after TikTok resolved a yearslong fight to address Washington’s national-security concerns. In January, the company officially established a joint venture to run its U.S. operations and last month, the White House lifted a 2023 restriction on the use of TikTok on federal government devices.

ByteDance, which has several lineups of AI models including video-generation tool Seedance, has been ramping up investment in AI to stay competitive with domestic and U.S. rivals.

Earlier this month, a syndicate of global banks agreed to lend ByteDance $29.6 billion, which will be used for general corporate purposes, including funding its AI research and development, people familiar with the matter said.

According to a recent internal memo seen by The Wall Street Journal, the company said it would raise the value it assigns to the restricted stock units some employees receive by 5% from around five months earlier to $241.35 a share. Based on that amount, the entire company would be valued at more than $400 billion. A private share sale earlier this year valued it at more than $600 billion, people familiar with the matter said.

The Information had previously reported on ByteDance’s first-half financials.