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mostly affect investor sentiment, we think, as SBER’s ambitious plans to operate Russia’s market-leading ecosystem might need to be completely reconsidered. At the same time, a break-up could improve SBER’s bottom line in the same way that last year’s break-up of its e- commerce partnership with YNDX did, as this split generated a gain of c. RUB 20bn for SBER.
AKAR released its Russian advertising market estimates for 4Q20. Online ad market growth improved to 12.2% y/y (following 1.7% growth in 3Q20), while total ad market growth climbed to 3.7% y/y (versus a 4.8% decline in 3Q20).
For the full year, the online ad market grew 3.7% to R253.0bn (net of VAT) and was the only segment that grew (the total market was down 4.2% at R473.4bn).
The full-year numbers came in above our forecast of 0.9% growth for the online ad market and a 5.7% decline for the overall ad market. For comparison, in 4Q20, Yandex's online ad revenues grew 3.9% y/y on an LFL basis, excluding Yandex.Market, and 5.5% y/y including Yandex.Market, to account for 46% of the overall online ad market in the quarter. Yandex's share of the overall online market came in at 50% in 2020, while its ad revenue growth on an LFL basis (excluding Yandex.Market) was flat y/y, we estimate. Mail.ru Group outperformed the market, posting y/y growth of 10.2% (for a 15% market share) in 4Q20 and 5.3% in 2020 (also for a 15% market share).
Based on the reported revenues, Yandex controlled 27% of the total media market and half of internet advertising, while Mail.ru accounted for 8% of the total market and 15% of the internet ad market in 2020.
143 RUSSIA Country Report April 2021 www.intellinews.com