Hello Group Q1 2026 Earnings Call - Overseas Growth Offsets Domestic Tax Headwinds

Operator: Ladies and gentlemen, thank you for standing by, and welcome to Hello Group’s first quarter 2026 earnings conference call. If you wish to ask a question, you will need to press the star key followed by the number 1 on your telephone keypad. Please note this conference is being recorded today. I would now like to hand the conference over to your first speaker today, Ms. Ashley Jing. Thank you. Please go ahead, ma’am.

Ashley Jing, IR/Moderator, Hello Group: Thank you, operator. Good morning and good evening, everyone. Thank you for joining us today for Hello Group’s first quarter 2026 earnings conference call. The company’s results were released earlier today and are available on the company’s IR website. On the call today are Mr. Yan Tang, CEO of the company, Ms. Sichuan Zhang, CEO of the company, and Ms. Hui Peng, CFO of the company. They will discuss the company’s business operations and highlights, as well as the financials and guidance. They will all be available to answer your questions during the Q&A session that follows. As we begin, I would like to remind you that this call may contain forward-looking statements made under the safe harbor provision of the Private Securities Litigation Reform Act of 1995.

Such statements are based on management’s current expectations and current market and operating conditions, and relate to events that involve known or unknown risks, uncertainties, and other factors. All of which are difficult to predict, and many of which are beyond the company’s control, which may cause the company’s actual results, performance, or achievements to differ materially from those in the forward-looking statements. Further information regarding this and other risks, uncertainties, and factors is included in the company’s filings with the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission. The company does not undertake any obligation to update any forward-looking statements as a result of new information, future events, or otherwise, except as required under law. I will now pass the call over to our CEO, Ms. Sichuan Zhang. Ms. Jiang, please.

Sichuan Zhang (Vic), CEO, Hello Group: Thank you, Ashley. Hello, everyone. Thank you for joining today’s call. The group maintained steady business momentum in Q1, guided by the strategic priorities set last year. Our domestic business stayed healthy through focused product innovation and refined operations despite external pressures. Leveraging the synergy of a diversified product portfolio, our overseas business has remained a positive trend. Looking ahead, we are fully confident in each business line to continue to advance along the strategic roadmap in 2026. I’ll walk you through the key updates. Starting with the financials. For Q1 2026, total group revenue was RMB 2.39 billion, down 5% year-over-year. Domestic revenue reached RMB 1.79 billion, down 15% year-over-year. Overseas revenue was RMB 597 million, up 44% year-over-year. Overseas revenue accounted for 25%, compared to 16% in the same period last year.

Adjusted operating income was RMB 349 million, up 1% year-over-year, with a margin of 14.6%. Building on the strategic direction from 2025, our 2026 priorities continue along three main tracks. For Momo, the goal is to ensure stable, sustained productivity of our cash cow business. For Tantan, to continue exploring a dating experience and efficient business model tailored for Asian users. For our new businesses, to deepen overseas presence, enrich our brand portfolio, and build a long-term growth engine. Let me walk you through each, starting with Momo. On the product side, our key focus in recent years has been to optimize user experience and stabilize our user base. This year, we have continued to refine the chat experience. Our Knock Knock feature improves connection accuracy by analyzing users’ historical chat patterns to optimize matching algorithms, driving sustained growth in two-way and in-depth chats.

In real-time chat scenarios, building on a steady ramp-up of voice features, we have also introduced video features to enrich our portfolio of instant interactions. The combined upgrades in our group recommendation and product experience have lowered the barrier for users to find chat partners. This is the main driver behind the steady improvement in retention among existing users. In 2025, we undertook a number of meaningful explorations in leveraging AI to improve users’ social efficiency with encouraging initial results. For example, our AI greetings and AI chat assist features improved the female users’ experience. This drove higher reply rates from male users and more in-depth conversation overall. In Q1, the product team explored AI-driven innovations such as voice-driven bottles, guiding users complete voice profiles, auto-generating voice content, and releasing it onto the platform in a message in a bottle format to spark users’ desire to connect.

For user acquisition, Channel ROI has remained fully profitable since the beginning of the year. Ongoing audio room gameplay updates and better channel conversion lifted payment intent among mid and small spending users. This drove steady LTV growth and channel ROI improved moderately quarter-over-quarter. Acquisition spend continued a refined, disciplined approach, narrowing slightly from last quarter. This is worth noting that Q1 was affected by the Chinese New Year, as some users shifted their social time to offline gathering and close friends and family. This temporary pullback platform activity and paying scale, with Momo’s paying users decreasing by 200,000 quarter-over-quarter to 3.7 million. Thanks to a year of product refinement focused on chat experience, organic traffic grew compared to last year, and retention among existing users improved slightly.

During the Chinese New Year, the team ran targeted operational events at a low point of the cycle, narrowing the decline in user activity compared to past holidays. As a result, the post-holiday recovery was meaningfully better than in the same period last year. This set a solid foundation for stabilizing our user base over the full year. Turning to Momo’s commercial performance. In Q1, Momo’s revenue was RMB 1.52 billion, down 15% year-over-year and 9% quarter-over-quarter. The year-over-year decline mainly reflects the ongoing impact of the new tax regulation and stricter local enforcement that came into effect in the second half of 2025. The motivation of some high-grossing agencies and broadcasters is still recovering. The sequential decline was largely seasonal, driven by the Chinese New Year, alongside persistently soft consumer spending sentiment.

In response to this external shift, the teams continued to direct gameplay innovation and operational resources towards mid-tier and long-tail users, keeping revenue from audio scenarios and social games such as Parking Wars relatively resilient. This helped partially absorb the external pressure on overall revenue. On the product and operation side, our live streaming business organized a series of user-oriented events during the Chinese New Year, effectively cushioning the dilution of online behavior from the long holiday. As a result, the post-holiday recovery in key operational metrics, including user engagement, paying conversion rate, and streamer return rate, was meaningfully stronger than in the same period last year. At the same time, we continued to introduce and selectively support high-quality talent streamer, lifting organic revenue through content quality improvements. In audio scenarios, we roll out the new PK game play to further motivate users to gift one another.

With some mid-tier and long-tail broadcasters and agencies on our platform facing ongoing profit pressure during the tax compliance process, we have rolled out a new incentive-based revenue-sharing policy. This is decided to enable the quality performance to deliver greater value to the platform while ensuring they make stable income in turn. Now let’s turn to Tantan. As of the end of Q1, Tantan had 0.6 million paying users, a modest decrease of 30,000 quarter-over-quarter. This decline was driven by two factors. First, the carryover from ongoing MAU decline, and second, Alipay’s changes to its auto-renewal paying billing rules, which placed short-term pressure on membership conversion. Under the continued effect of our strategic marketing cuts, Tantan’s user base remained on the downward trajectory, though the magnitude of decline has narrowed meaningfully.

Through algorithm innovation and refined operations, engagement, and retention among younger users showed slight improvements, contributing positive to user base stability. On the product side, the team optimized recommendation strategies in our core swipe-based scenario. For example, we introduced tiered restrictions on female users’ metrics, allowing only horizontal or upward matching, a benefit for female users through our social expectations. This drove a near three percentage point increase in average swipe per female user, slightly improving the retention. On new scenario exploration, we piloted map-based, social, and AI chat assist features. On user acquisition, although the year-over-year reduction in channel investment led to a lower required volume, the meaningful narrowing the unit acquisition cost partially offset the impact. Additionally, because organic traffic outperformed channel traffic on both user engagement and retention, the overall decline in our user base was far smaller than the channel-driven declines implied by our strategic cuts.

Sequentially, both spend and user acquisition costs narrowed by various degrees. The channel volume decline was relatively limited. While Alipay’s new rule policy created new near-term app pull pressure, channel ROI was sustained well above 100% throughout the quarter. On the financial side in Q1, Tantan’s domestic business generated RMB 125 million in revenue, down 25% year-over-year and 8% quarter-over-quarter. The primary driver remains MAU contraction leading to fewer paying users, compounded by the short-term impact of Alipay’s policy adjustments on various payments. On monetization, the team unbundled membership features into a la carte offerings while enriching Flash Chats game playing and stepping up in-app promotion to ease top-line pressure. On profitability, thanks to ongoing cuts in channel investment and personnel costs, net profits grew significantly year-over-year. Lastly, our new businesses.

Our 2026 goal carries forward from 2025 to deepen our overseas presence, enrich our brand portfolio, and build a long-term growth engine. In Q1, overseas revenue totaled RMB 597 million, up 44% year-over-year with a slight 2% sequential decline. Overseas now accounted for 25% of group revenue compared to 16% in the same period last year. The sequential softness was mainly due to some external challenges Social faced during the quarter, which weighted on our overseas business overall. Excluding Social, the rest of our overseas businesses continued to deliver healthy growth this quarter, further validating the value of diversified product portfolio in dispensing risk from single product volatility. Our two newer product in MENA, Yaahlan and amar, continued their rapid growth trajectory with both delivering triple-digit revenue growth year-over-year in Q1.

Driven by continuously improving localized operations, a more precise grasp of local user preferences, and sustained game plan innovation, both products saw concurrent improvement in revenue and profit. This quarter, Yaahlan is approaching net income break even, and amar achieved positive marginal contribution for the first time. This is a significant milestone making our shift in MENA from a Social-dominated model to a multi-product portfolio. Beyond our audio and video social products in MENA region, our dating business focused on developed markets is another important pillar of our overseas footprint. Also deliver satisfying progress this quarter. Panda International, led by our Singapore team, completed a full upgrade of product positioning and branding over the past year. In second half of 2025, began migrating from a shared domestic international app build to a standalone overseas app.

The migration was completed in Q1 with 99% of paying users successfully transferred, minimizing the revenue impact of the version split. Starting in Q2, the team’s focus will turn to further optimizing product experience and improving monetization efficiency. Separately, Happn, which joined the group last year, has continued a steady, healthy growth trajectory since the beginning of this year. Happn’s user base has remained relatively stable over the past year, and both sequential and year-over-year revenue growth came mainly from improvements in paid conversion rate and app pull. Reflecting greater efficiencies in operating the existing user base. In Q1, we began testing Happn’s entry into new markets, laying the foundation for the brand’s mid to long-term growth. As a relatively newer segment for our overseas front, we remain confident in the dating business’ continued release of growth potential in 2026. This concludes my remarks.

Now let me pass the call to Cathy for the financial review. Cathy, please.

Hui Peng (Cassie), CFO, Hello Group: Thanks, Vic. Hello, everyone. Thank you for joining our conference call today. Now let me take you through the financial review. Total revenue for the first quarter 2026 was RMB 2.39, down 5% year-on-year and 7% quarter-on-quarter. Non-GAAP net income attributable to the shareholders of the company was RMB 328.8 million compared to RMB 403.8 million in the same period of 2025, and RMB 281.3 million in the previous quarter. Looking into the key revenue items for Q1. Total revenue for value-added services for the first quarter of 2026 was RMB 2.35 billion, down 6% year-on-year and 7% quarter-on-quarter. On a geographic basis, PRC mainland value-added service revenue was RMB 1.76 billion, down 15% year-over-year and 9% quarter-over-quarter.

The decrease was primarily due to heightened tax scrutiny on the agencies for Momo’s entertainment business, combined with softened consumer sentiments amid broader macro pressure, and to a lesser degree, a decline in paying users on Tantan. VAS overseas revenue reached RMB 593.7 million, up 44% year-over-year, driven by the rapid expansion of our diversified product portfolio. Overseas VAS revenue decreased slightly by 2% sequentially due to seasonal factor, namely Ramadan, as well as some external challenges in MENA area during the quarter. Turning to cost and expenses. Non-GAAP cost of revenue for the first quarter of 2026 was RMB 1.46 billion compared to RMB 1.57 billion for the same period last year. Non-GAAP gross margin for the quarter was 38.8% compared to 37.9% from year-ago period. Gross profit margin or GPM in Q1 2026 rose by around one percentage point year wide.

The increase was primarily driven by improved margins in MENA products after lowering the revenue sharing ratio to promote quality growth, together with a greater revenue mix from higher margin overseas dating products. This was partially offset by decline in Momo’s GPM resulted from increased payout ratio to agencies in order to cushion the impact from the tax scrutiny. Non-GAAP R&D expenses for the first quarter was RMB 165.2 million compared to RMB 185.9 million for the same period last year, representing an 11% decrease year wide. The decrease was due to overall labor cost savings from the optimization of our personnel structure. Non-GAAP R&D expenses as a percentage of revenue was 7%, same as Q1 last year. We ended the quarter with 1,396 total employees, compared to 1,336 from a year ago.

The R&D personnel as a percentage of total employee for the group was 56%, compared with 58% from Q1 last year. Non-GAAP sales and marketing expenses for the first quarter was RMB 335.4 million, compared to RMB 322.1 million for the same period last year, representing a 14% and a 13% of total revenue, respectively. The year-over-year increase in sales and marketing expenses was mainly driven by increased marketing investments in our new overseas apps. This was partially offset by continued cost control in our PRC mainland operations, as both Momo and Tantan reduced marketing spend, while Sochio also temporarily scaled back channel investments amid external challenges. Non-GAAP G&A expenses was RMB 89.4 million for the first quarter, compared to RMB 114.8 million for the same period last year, representing a 4% and 5% of total revenue, respectively.

The decrease in G&A expenses was primarily attributable to a high base effect in Q1 2025, resulting from a self-inspection related to tax matters. Non-GAAP operating income was RMB 349.2 million, representing a margin of 14.6%, compared with RMB 345.3 million and a margin of 13.7% from Q1 2025. The increase was driven by improvement in GPM. Non-GAAP OPEX as a percentage of total revenue stood at 25%, unchanged from the year-ago period. Briefly on income tax expenses. Total non-GAAP income tax expenses was RMB 81.5 million for the quarter, with an effective tax rate of 20%. In Q1, the company accrued withholding income tax of RMB 21.2 million, which is 10% of undistributed profit generated by our loan fee. Without the withholding tax, our estimated non-GAAP effective tax rate was around 15% in the first quarter. Turning to balance sheet and cash flow items.

As of March 31st, 2026, Hello Group’s cash equivalents, short-term deposits, long-term deposits, short-term investments, and restricted cash totaled RMB 8.56 billion, compared to RMB 8.68 billion as of December 31st, 2025. Net cash provided by operating activities in the first quarter of 2026 was RMB 158.9 million. The difference between operating net cash and Non-GAAP net income was mainly due to a significant increase in accounts receivable caused by temporary payment collection delays on one of our apps, as well as higher other current liabilities from the accrual of year-end bonuses and the 13th-month payroll. Lastly, on business outlook. We estimated our second quarter revenue to come in the range from RMB 2.45 billion to RMB 2.55 billion, representing a decrease of 6.5%-2.7% year-on-year.

This is based on the assumption that at midpoint, on a year-over-year basis, revenue from our mainland China business would decline by high teens percentage-wise, while overseas revenue is expected to grow by high 50s percentage-wise. Please be mindful that this forecast represents the company’s current and preliminary view on the market and operational conditions, which are subject to change. That concluded our prepared portion of today’s discussion. With that, let me turn the call back to Ashley to start Q&A. Ashley, please.

Ashley Jing, IR/Moderator, Hello Group: Just a quick reminder for those who can speak Chinese, please ask your questions in Chinese first, followed by English translation by yourself. Please also limit the number of questions to a maximum of two. Operator, we’re ready for questions, please. Thank you.

Operator: Thank you. If you wish to ask a question, please press star one on your telephone and wait for your name to be announced. If you wish to cancel your request, please press star two. If you are on a speakerphone, please pick up the handset to ask your question. Your first question today comes from Xueqing Zhang with CICC. Please go ahead.

Xueqing Zhang, Analyst, CICC: Thanks.

Hui Peng (Cassie), CFO, Hello Group: Thanks, management, for taking my question. My question is about the overseas business. Regarding the MENA business, she mentioned in her prepared remarks that Sochio faced some challenges from external factors in the first quarter. Could management provide more details on what happened, and will this have any impact on the full-year revenue outlook for the overseas business? She also mentioned that the two new products continue to see relative revenue growth while the losses kept narrowing. Could management share when this new business is expected to turn profitable? Going forward, will the company continue to increase marketing investments to scale these products, or will you focus more on narrowing losses and moving toward profitability? Thank you.

Ashley Jing, IR/Moderator, Hello Group: Let me start with what was dragging Social down in Q1. The sequential revenue decline came down to three main things. Number 1 is the Turkish government tightened regulation on social and streaming apps, which temporarily resulted in a blanket removal of all related products across the industry. That created a headwind for us in terms of new user acquisition in Turkey. Number 2 is seasonality. Consumer sentiment in the MENA region during Ramadan was relatively softer. As a large and rather mature product, Social was more noticeably impacted by this seasonal kind of headwinds. Number 3 is the ongoing conflict in the Middle East. That has also had some drag on Social’s revenue in the Gulf region.

Yan Tang, CEO, Hello Group: 我们认为Social完全符合土耳其当地对于社交产品的各项法律法规和监管的政策。目前Social团队正在和土耳其的有关部门进行沟通，希望可以尽快上架。同时我们也会加快其他地区的本地化拓展，来弥补土耳其地区的缺口。目前Social的业务从Q1的低点已经开始稳步回升，投资人无需对此过于担心。

Ashley Jing, IR/Moderator, Hello Group: We are confident that Social fully compliant with all applicable Turkish laws and regulations governing social platforms. Our team is actively working with the relevant authorities to bring the app back to the App Store as soon as possible. In the meantime, we are accelerating localization efforts in other markets to offset the temporary impact from Turkey. Social’s business has already begun to see a steady recovery from the Q1 low. We do not believe investors need to be overly concerned about it.

Yan Tang, CEO, Hello Group: 中东北非地区的另外两款新产品，一季度收入保持快速增长，亏损也在迅速缩窄。给大家一些数字概念，收入同比三位数的增长。随着业务的不断规模化，团队可以逐步调整分成比例。毛利率在过去一年持续显著提升。我们在获客ROI回收达标的前提下，适度加大了投放规模，积极测试新的潜力市场。与此同时，亏损规模在逐季缩窄。整体来说，我们对于中东市场这两款新产品的发展路径非常清晰，先把规模做起来，把毛利结构优化好，投放以ROI为导向，让净利润自然兑现。然后应该一个季度之内可以实现经营利。amar发展阶段大概落后半年左右。至于海外今年整体的收入预期，请Cassie介绍。

Ashley Jing, IR/Moderator, Hello Group: The other two new Mana products had a strong Q1, triple-digit year-over-year revenue growth with losses narrowing rapidly. As the business has scaled, the team has been able to gradually adjust the revenue-sharing structure, driving meaningful and sustained growth margin improvement over the past year. We have selectively increasing marketing spends where ROI targets are being met, and are actively testing new markets while keeping the loss trajectory moving in the right direction each quarter. Our path for these two Mana products is pretty clear: build scale first, optimize the growth margin structure, keep marketing ROI-driven, and let net profitability flow naturally. Yaahlan should keep net profitability within a quarter. amar is about half a year behind on that trajectory. For the full year overseas revenue outlook, I will hand it over to Cassie.

Hui Peng (Cassie), CFO, Hello Group: Okay. Let me first break the overseas outlook into three separate pieces. First is our flagship overseas app, Social. As Tang Zou mentioned earlier, Social was under some pressure in Q1, mainly due to regulatory changes in Turkey, as well as the prolonged geopolitical tensions in parts of the Middle East. That said, I think the team has adapted reasonably well to the changing environment. While revenue in Turkey remains somewhat pressured, performance in other Middle Eastern markets has actually been quite solid. Overall, I would say that Social, particularly in the first half of the year, is likely to come in a bit below our original expectations, but the business itself remains fundamentally healthy. If you look at the second piece, for the two newer social entertainment apps we’ve been scaling in the MENA region, their trends are actually developing very much in line with our plans.

Third, for the dating and membership-oriented business outside of the MENA region, that part of the portfolio has remained very much on track. Honestly, that’s one of the things that makes dating a membership business model pretty attractive. Compared with entertainment-driven platforms, the revenue visibility and forecasting clarity are generally much higher. Putting these three pieces together, if you recall what we said on the last earnings call, we mentioned that overseas revenue for 2025 was, I think, somewhere around RMB 2 billion. This year, for 2026, we are likely to hit RMB 3 billion milestone. At this point, our overall view really hasn’t changed materially. Depending on how market expansion progresses across different regions, there could still be somewhere around RMB 100 million of variation, either to the upside or to the downside of that RMB 3 billion number.

Based on what we see today, we remain pretty comfortable with that original range.

Ashley Jing, IR/Moderator, Hello Group: Hopefully that answers your question. Back to Ashley for the question. Hi. I’ll bring the next question, please.

Operator: Thank you. Your next question comes from Thomas Chong with Jefferies. Please go ahead.

Thomas Chong, Analyst, Jefferies: 晚上好，谢谢管理层接受我的提问。我们看到Q1的话呢，国内的业务的收入同比下降大概是15%，比2025年全年降幅的幅度有所扩大。想问管理层可以介绍一下主要的压力来自于刚刚在earnings call提到那个税务新规对Momo的影响。另外呢，再想多了解一下这个外部的因素，我们什么时候可以完全地消化？这个第一。第二的话，刚刚也是提到，在Alipay自动续费这个调整下了，对Tantan的付费转化做成一个短期的影响。可否具体说明一下这个调整的影响的范围，还有持续的时间？这个会否在扩散到Momo还有其他订阅类的产品？最后的问题是关于我们应该如何去看待国内业务全年收入的预期？谢谢。Hi, good evening. Thanks management for taking my question. In Q1, we saw domestic revenue declined by 15% year on year, and the year on year decline widened versus 2025.

Management comments this is related to the new tax rules which affect Momo. May I understand when should we expect these external factors to be fully digested? On the other hand, management comments Alipay automatic renewal has some changes which need to short term impact to Tantan conversion. Can management comments about the scope for this adjustment and how long will it last? Should we expect this will affect Momo and other subscription products as well? Lastly, how should we think about the full year outlook for the domestic revenue? Thank you.

Yan Tang, CEO, Hello Group: 我先讲一下税务对Momo的影响吧。2025年下半年，税务新规和地方强化征管，对聊天室相关的公会造成比较明显的冲击。为了缓和这个供给侧的压力，2025年下半年我们适度调整了部分核心公会的分成，对去年受到影响的公会起到了积极的作用。但今年年初，税务局对公会进行了新的一轮政策收紧，这对我们三四月的公会流水造成了比较大的影响。因此我们在5月中旬选定部分优质的公会，来帮助他们实现这个税务合规。对于额外的税务合规给这些公会带来的利润压力，我们推出了新的公会激励政策，对这些优质公会给予了进一步的让利。从5月下旬到目前的流水情况来看，这些公会的工作积极性和流水都在快速地恢复，希望三季度能够回归到一个正常的水平。

Ashley Jing, IR/Moderator, Hello Group: Let me first address the impact of tax policies on Momo. New tax regulations introduced in the second half of 2025, combined with stricter local tax collection and enforcement, affected agencies operating chat room scenario. To alleviate the pressure on the supply side, we moderately adjusted the revenue sharing ratios for key agencies in the latter half of last year, which yield positive results for those impacted. However, tax authorities further tightened their policies targeting agencies in early 2026, resulting in a decline in agency related revenue during March and April. In response, we selected a group of high-quality agencies in mid-May and began assisting them with tax compliance. To help offset the profit pressure caused by additional compliance costs, we introduced a new incentive program and provided further financial support to these selected agencies.

Since late May, both operational enthusiasm and revenue among these agencies have rebounded actually rapidly. We expect their performance to return to normal level by Q3.

Yan Tang, CEO, Hello Group: 至于Momo Ask何时回到同比的增长，除了税务因素外，还取决于宏观消费情绪何时回暖。我们能控制的是把产品的基本盘做扎实，把运营效率最大化。我们对Momo的商业化效率还是非常有信心的。

Ashley Jing, IR/Moderator, Hello Group: As for when Momo will return to year-over-year growth, beyond the tax issue, it also depends on when broader consumer sentiment picks back up. What we can control is making sure the product fundamentals are rock solid and operating efficiency is maximized. We are very confident in Momo’s monetization capabilities.

Yan Tang, CEO, Hello Group: 关于支付宝代扣规则调整的问题，确实对探探一季度的会员收入造成了一定影响，主要体现在续费转化率阶段性的承压，导致一小部分的存量会员流失。团队应对很迅速，商业化层面采取了拆权售卖的策略，把原本捆绑在会员套餐里的，例如超级喜欢、优先推荐这类高频特权单独拆出来卖。同时还升级了散聊这种按次数付费的玩法，因此对冲会员续费下滑。目前我们正在丰富支付渠道，引导用户使用受影响较小的支付方式，购买长周期的会员产品。

Ashley Jing, IR/Moderator, Hello Group: On the Alipay auto-renewal policy changes, yes, this did impact Tantan’s membership business in Q1, primarily manifesting as a temporary decline in renewal rates, and resulting in some subscriber churn. The team actually responded swiftly. On the monetization side, we launched an unbundling strategy, separating high-frequency perks that were previously bundled into membership packages, such as Super Likes and Boosts, and offering them as standalone purchases. We have also enhanced our a la carte pay-as-you-go features, like Flash Chats, to help offset the headwinds in membership renewals. In addition, we are diversifying payment channels, encouraging users to shift towards less affected options, and promoting longer-term membership plans.

Yan Tang, CEO, Hello Group: 至于影响范围，支付宝代扣调整主要影响的是订阅类的会员制产品。Momo的主要付费模式是消耗型的虚拟礼物，不依赖自动续费代扣，所以影响很小。海外业务用的是App Store和Google Play的支付通道，也不受影响。所以这是一个相对局部的影响，主要集中在探探的国内会员业务上。持续时间方面，预计影响主要集中在上半年。下半年随着我们支付通道和会员结构调整完成，影响会逐步出清。关于国内业务全年的收入预期，还是请Cassie来给大家分享。

Ashley Jing, IR/Moderator, Hello Group: In terms of scope, the Alipay policy changes primarily affected subscription or membership products. Momo’s core payment model is based on consumable virtual gifts, which do not rely on auto-renewal, the impact is actually quite minimal. Our overseas business uses App Store or Google Play payment channels, which remain unaffected. Overall, this is a relatively contained issue, primarily impacting only Tantan’s domestic membership business. On timing, we expect the impact to be concentrated in the first half of the year, with the situation gradually improving in the second half as we diversify payment channels and membership structures. For the full-year domestic revenue outlook, I will hand it over to Cassie.

Hui Peng (Cassie), CFO, Hello Group: Okay. Time for an update on how we are thinking about the revenue outlook for the rest of 2026. I will, as in previous quarters, use the same framework, which is set upon three key elements: the macro environment, the regulatory environment, and our own platform fundamentals. Along those lines, starting with the macro side, honestly, consumer sentiment looks largely unchanged from what we saw at the end of last year, and through Q1. It remains relatively soft, importantly, we are not seeing any meaningful deterioration either. On the regulatory front, this is really where most of the incremental pressure came from in Q1 and Q2. You are right that the year-over-year decline in Q1 widened versus last year. If you look at our Q2 guidance, the domestic revenue decline is expected to widen further from Q1’s level.

The main reason is tighter tax scrutiny on some of the small and medium-sized agencies in our ecosystem, which hit March, April, and early May particularly hard. In response, we rolled out new agency incentive policies to encourage tax compliance. The goal here is very straightforward. We want to maintain the long-term health and stability of the content ecosystem and continue supporting the agencies that create the most value on the platform. Since rolling out these measures in late May, we’ve already started seeing encouraging feedback and some improvement in operating trends. We do expect June performance to benefit from these adjustments. That said, April and May were clearly impacted by the tightened regulatory environment, and that pressure is reflected in our Q2 guidance. Some of the impact could still carry into Q3, but at this stage, we believe the most difficult period is likely behind us already.

Now turning to platform fundamentals, as Sig mentioned in the prepared remarks, the core business itself remains very solid. Outside of the regulatory pressure, there really hasn’t been any material change in the underlying business fundamentals compared with what we saw in Q1. Looking into the second half of the year, we still expect the year-over-year decline rate to narrow meaningfully. Part of this is because the regulatory impact should gradually normalize as the year progresses, and part of it is simply because the comparison base becomes significantly easier in the second half of 2025. For the second half, we still expect the domestic business decline rate to improve to somewhere below 15% year-over-year. That said, given the additional disruption that we saw in the first half from tax tightening, we are modestly adjusting our full year outlook.

Previously, we were guiding to a low teens decline for the domestic business. Based on what we see so far happen in the first half, we now expect the full year decline to be closer to somewhere around mid-teens year-over-year. That’s how we are currently thinking about the domestic revenue outlook. Back to Ashley, maybe for one more question.

Ashley Jing, IR/Moderator, Hello Group: Yeah. In the interest of time, let’s just take one last question before we close the line. We’re ready. Thank you, operator.

Operator: Thank you. Your next question comes from Jenny Yuan with UBS. Please go ahead.

Jenny Yuan, Analyst, UBS: 管玉臣晚上好，谢谢管玉臣提问机会。我的问题是关于我们的AI的创新应用，以及对于我们盈利能力的潜力展望。管玉臣在过去一年财报中多次也提到了AI相关的产品创新，从今年的AI招呼破冰、深度助聊，到本季度我们提到的AI语音漂流瓶。我就想了解一下集团现在对于AI产品功能上还有哪些部署？怎么看待AI创新对于长期业绩的一个拉动作用？那么AI的投入是不是会影响我们短期的一个利润情况？能针对年初国内和海外业务都面临的一些外部压力，那我们如何看待集团全年的一个利润情况？

Hui Peng (Cassie), CFO, Hello Group: Let me translate myself. Management has highlighted AI-driven product innovation in several releases over the past year. Ranging from AI-powered ice-breaking feature, AI assistant chat features, to the newly launched AI voice message drift bottles this quarter. Could you please share more details on the group’s AI product roadmap going forward? More broadly, how do you view the contribution of AI innovation to our longer-term money growth? Should we expect any meaningful impact on near-term profitability from AI investment? Given the external challenges faced by both domestic and overseas business at the end of the year, how do we expect the group’s full year profit outlook and margin to capture a full year? Thank you.

Yan Tang, CEO, Hello Group: AI对于我们这种以社交产品为核心业务的公司来说，有非常直接的意义。我们的产品玩法和推荐逻辑本质上是降低用户间建立连接的门槛，实现长期有效互动，提供情绪价值。AI在这方面是能够让用户体验产生质变的技术工具。

Hui Peng (Cassie), CFO, Hello Group: AI is particularly meaningful for a company like ours, where social products are the core. The essence of our product features and recommendation logic is to lower the barriers for users to form connections, and enable long-term and effective interactions, and deliver emotional value. AI is a tool that can genuinely transform the user experience in this space.

Yan Tang, CEO, Hello Group: 我们目前的实践看，AI在产品侧具备两种不同的发展方向。第一，用户之间辅助破冰，降低社交门槛，比如我们的AI助聊的功能，以及正在测试的AI语音漂流瓶。通过AI引导用户以语音的形式完善基本的个人信息。AI基于用户真实信息、真实声音，自动生成更加生动有趣的自我介绍和招呼内容，并以漂流瓶的方式发布在平台。这类AI辅助工具对有交友需求但社交能力不足的用户群体非常有价值。第二，新产品的形态。例如甜甜圈，是一款全AI驱动的语音社交产品，目前在国内已启动商业化尝试。海外的AI角色扮演恋爱产品MiraiMind在日本市场也取得了不错的早期数据，目前正在向亚洲的其他市场延伸。这类产品代表了我们用AI探索下一代社交产品形态的方向。

Hui Peng (Cassie), CFO, Hello Group: Based on what we have built so far, AI is advancing in two distinct directions on the product side. First, enhancing connections between users by breaking the ice and lowering social barriers. Examples include our AI-assisted chat features and the AI voice drift bottle, which we are currently testing. The concept is that AI guides users to provide basic profile information through voice input, and then automatically generates more vivid and engaging self-introduction and greetings using the user’s actual voice. This is then published on the platform as a drift bottle. These AI tools are particularly valuable for users who have dating needs, but relatively weaker social skills. Second, enabling new products formats. For example, Donut is fully AI-powered voice social product that has already begun monetization in China.

On the overseas side, our AI role-play dating app MiraiMind has shown solid early traction in Japan, and is now expanding to other Asian markets. These products represent our exploration of what next-generation social experience can look like.

Yan Tang, CEO, Hello Group: 关于投入对利润的影响，我们的判断是AI投入是高回报，它能够直接提升用户体验，进而提升用户的付费意愿。执行层面，AI在我们产品中的渗透还在快速的扩展阶段。过去一年，我们重点跑通了AI招呼和辅助聊天在Momo主站的算法迭代。后续我们会把这套技术体系横向复用到更多的场景，包括Momo直播AI经纪人功能，基于主播形象生成AI短剧，Tantan的智能匹配与分发以及辅助聊天功能。这种技术资产的横向复用，有助于AI技术投入的回报最大化。至于集团全年的利润预期，还是请Cassie来回答吧。

Ashley Jing, IR/Moderator, Hello Group: Regarding the impact of AI investment on profitability, our view is that AI spending is high return in nature. It directly improves user experience and drives higher propensity to pay. From an execution standpoint, AI’s penetration across our products is still in a rapid expansion phase. Over the past year, we focused on refining the AI greeting and AI-assisted chat algorithm on the Momo platform. Going forward, we will be replicating that tech stack across more use cases, including AI agents for Momo live streaming, AI short dramas generation based on broadcasters’ images, as well as smarter matching and content distribution on Tantan, and AI-assisted chatting features. This kind of horizontal reuse of the tech stack helps maximize the return on AI investment. For the group’s full year profitability outlook, I’ll pass it over to Cassie.

Hui Peng (Cassie), CFO, Hello Group: Okay. On profitability outlook, I’ll just go back to the framework that we laid out at the beginning of the year on our March earnings call. Starting from the top line, if you combine our updated view on the domestic business with what I just discussed on the overseas side, we now expect group revenue for 2026 to see a slight year-over-year decline versus 2025, probably down by a couple of percentage points at the top level. At the beginning of the year, we also said that we were targeting adjusted operating margin in the low teens. Based on what we see today, that target still looks quite achievable. That said, because the domestic business faced additional pressure from the tax-related disruption in Q1 and the early part of Q2, our full year revenue outlook in absolute dollar terms is now somewhat lower than where we started the year.

Naturally, that creates more pressure in terms of absolute profit amounts. Internally, we are looking at additional opportunities to optimize spending wherever appropriate and necessary, whether on personnel side, marketing efficiency, or other operating areas where we believe we can improve productivity without affecting long-term growth initiatives. Overall, I would say that we remain broadly on track to achieve the profitability targets that we laid out at the beginning of the year. I think that wraps up the call. Now I’m handing back to Ashley for closing remarks.

Ashley Jing, IR/Moderator, Hello Group: Right. Thank you for participating today. That’s going to be the end of the call, and we will see you next quarter. Thank you. Bye.

Operator: Thank you.

Thank you. That does conclude our conference for today. Thank you for participating. You may now disconnect.