Welcome to the Match Group Second Quarter 2021 Earnings Conference Call. All participants will be in listen only mode. Please note this event is being recorded. I would now like to turn the conference over to Bill Archer, Head of Investor Relations and Corporate Development. Please go ahead.
Thank you, operator, and good morning, everyone. Today's call will be led by CEO, Shahriar Dubey and CFO and COO, Gary Swidler. They'll make a few brief remarks, and then we'll open it up for questions. Before we start, I need to remind everyone that during this call, we may discuss our outlook and future performance. These forward looking statements may be preceded by words such as we expect, we believe, we anticipate or similar statements.
These statements are subject to risks and uncertainties, and our actual results could differ materially from the views expressed today. Some of these risks have been set forth in our earnings release and our periodic reports filed with the SEC. With that, I'd like to turn the call over to Shar.
Thank you, Bill. Good morning and thank you for joining the call today. Gary and I are once again doing this from our here in Dallas. And while our offices are not fully open yet, we did resume some travel And in person meetings in Q2 as the vast majority of our employees got vaccinated. And this optimism was also reflected The sentiment of our users, particularly in the U.
S. And parts of Europe. As a result, every one of our major brands Grew revenue in Q2, collectively delivering 27% year over year growth. And we have solid momentum as we enter the second half of the year. As much as I'm ready for COVID to no longer be a topic of discussion, It does appear that we have to live with it for a little while longer.
At the end of the day, wide Spread global vaccinations are really the only way out of this pandemic for us, which is why our brands have been on PSAs and vaccine information campaigns and even a summer rapid about the vaccine. Turns out, daters are open to and are getting vaccinated at higher rates than the average population, which is certainly a very good thing. And vaccine badges have become a very attractive feature on many of our platforms. In recent weeks, we have been monitoring the surge of the Delta variant and the various restrictions in countries, particularly in Asia. We've learned a lot these past 16 months about the impact of case surges and restrictions to mobility, Uncertainty driving news cycles, etcetera, on our metrics and business in various parts of the world and our confidence in the continued resilience And for me, one of the exciting things about this quarter was Tinder's product launches, which are part of an App experience transformation journey that quite frankly we haven't undertaken since its very early days.
The team there is executing really well, carefully testing the building blocks of this transformation roadmap. It's been super encouraging to see the promising engagement metrics with these new products And Tinder subscriberpayer additions in Q2 were among some of the highest we've seen. And this momentum has continued into July. In the Q2, we also closed the Hyperconnect deal. And even though travel restrictions have prevented us from meeting in person, our teams have quickly mobilized to are to both help calibrate and collaborate to drive profitable growth for Hyperconnect's Azar and Hakuna apps and lay out the broader strategy and roadmap for social discovery.
We are also starting the work to roll out Hyperkinect's video, audio and AI technologies onto our platforms over the next several months. Longer term, there is much about this acquisition that excites us. We expect Asia Pacific will soon contribute over 20% of our overall revenue and still offers the biggest growth opportunity Given where the category awareness and penetration stands today and Hyperkinet gives us a strong talented team and footprint in the region. The more I learn about the AR, the conversational AI and other technologies their team and incubation lab has been working on, The more I am excited about the ability to leverage this on our dating platforms to provide a richer, more akin to real life experience online. Everything from self expression to getting to know each other can be transformed.
You know, one of the Holy Grails for us in online dating has always been to bridge the disconnect that happens between People chatting online and then meeting someone in person. And these technologies will eventually allow us to build experiences that will help people determine if they have that much elusive chemistry or not. And so as we Finally, as part of our continuing journey as a fully independent company, we released our first impact report in Q2. I have always felt lucky to have spent much of my career at a company with such a fundamental and important social mission of bringing people together and helping them find dates and relationships and love and marriage. We've always been inspired by the success Stories of our members, the millions of babies born and love that has been forged by our platforms.
And in this annual report, in addition to the social work that we do, we are committed to sharing Leading technology and solutions for online safety. I feel very good about where we are as a company, as a business, And I look forward to continuing to deliver on our vision and goals. And while the delta variant surge Is a reminder that we aren't fully out of the pandemic woods yet. We do have more data and understanding to be able to manage And with that, I will hand it over to Gary to talk more about the quarter.
Thanks, Shar. It's great to be here again in person with you and the team in Dallas today. Seeing colleagues working together makes me very much look forward today's when the office will be filled with activity once again. We had a terrific Q2 with 27% year over year total revenue growth, the strongest growth the company has achieved since 2018. Non Tinder brands grew direct revenue 28% year over year in the quarter, the 6th consecutive quarter where these brands grew in aggregate.
Hinge, POF! Live And our BLK and Chispa apps continue to perform very well. Hinge grew revenue nearly 150% in the quarter, driven by strength in both subscription and a lacarte, led by Rose's and Standouts. At Tinder, Propensity to pay has improved significantly, which you can see in the alacarte revenue strength as well as overall payer numbers. Tinder saw a notable acceleration in year over year direct revenue growth to 26% in Q2, up from 18% year over year growth last quarter and 13% year over year growth in Q4 2020.
Our direct revenue grew 25% in the Americas, 28% in Europe and 31% in APAC and other. Our U. S. Performance is exceptionally strong and our performance in Europe is trailing slightly behind the U. S, consistent with the pace of the recovery there.
APAC and other growth also was solid in Q2, But a number of markets there, including important ones for us like Japan, are now facing increased COVID restrictions. Note that we are now disclosing the performance of the business in 3 geographic regions to give investors better insight into our results. Indirect revenue grew 54% year over year, marking a 3rd consecutive strong quarter as the advertising market generally So our metrics reflect about 2 weeks of contribution. Net of certain one time purchase accounting adjustments, Hyperconnect contributed $4,300,000 of revenue in Q2. We have broken this information out in the shareholder letter so you can see what Match Group X Hyper Connect and what Hyper Connect itself delivered in Q2.
We have also moved to disclosing payers and monthly revenue per payer. In the quarter, Total payers reached $15,000,000 which was an increase of 15% from Q2 2020. Growth was strong in all geographies, up 16% year over year in the Americas, 13% in Europe and 17% in APAC and other. Tinder payers were up 17% year over year in Q2. For comparison purposes, In Q2, average subscribers increased 1,300,000 over the prior year to 11,400,000, representing 13% year over year growth.
Tinder's average subscribers were up just under 1,100,000 or 17% year over and came in at $7,200,000 in total. This was the best Tinder year over year subscriber growth since the pandemic began and was very strong sequentially as well. All other brands' average subscribers were up 240,000 or 6% year over year. Revenue per payer increased 10% year over year to 15.46. It was up 8% in the Americas, 13% in Europe and 12% in APAC and other.
RPP was up 8% year over year at Tinder. RPP derived 3 percentage points of growth, dollars 0.53 from foreign exchange impacts in the quarter. At Tinder, Platinum sales and strength in a lacarte contributed to RPP growth. Continued strong performance of Plenty of Fish's live streaming business and Hinge's alacarte features contributed to the strength in RPP at the Established and Emerging Brands respectively. Total company ARPU was up 10% year over year to $0.65 Non Tinder Brands ARPU growth was extremely strong again this quarter, up 16% year over year and Tinder ARPU was up 7% year over year.
Operating income grew 7% EBITDA grew 15% year over year in Q2. EBITDA margins were 37%. Net of purchase accounting adjustments, Hyperconnect reduced Match Group EBITDA by $3,000,000 in Q2 from $266,000,000 to $263,000,000 Overall expenses, including SBC expense, increased to 70% of revenue compared to 65% in Q2 2020 when we pulled back on spending as the pandemic took hold. Cost of revenue grew 30% year over year, impacted by higher IFVs, web hosting costs and fees related to live streaming video at Plenty of Fish. Sales and marketing spend was up $38,000,000 or 42% year over year, close to what we had anticipated, and represented 18% of total revenue in Q2 as many of our brands spent into reopenings.
Product development costs grew 24% year over year as we increased headcount at several brands, mainly Tinder and Hinge. G and A expense was 66% year over year and comprised 16% of revenue. G and A in Q2 included $4,000,000 of professional fees and $9,000,000 of stock based comp expense, both related to the acquisition of Hyperconnect. Our gross leverage declined to 3.9x at the end of Q2, while our net leverage was 3.7x as we use cash on hand for a portion of the consideration in the Hyperconnect purchase. We're pleased to see both gross and net leverage below 4 times and we're on track for net leverage below 3x by the end of 2021.
For Q3, we expect total revenue for Match Group of $790,000,000 to $805,000,000 which would represent 23% to 26% year over year growth. That's solid growth off what was a very strong Q3 2020 as daters emerge from the initial wave of lockdowns in North America and Europe And Asia had COVID under control. We expect EBITDA of $275,000,000 to $280,000,000 in Q3. This reflects an additional $15,000,000 of costs in the second half of the year versus our prior expectations For government relations and other advocacy related to App Store practices and for legal matters, including the former Tinder employee litigation, as we prepare for a fall trial. We think plaintiff's claims in that case are totally without merit and are fully prepared to defend ourselves vigorously to the end.
We currently expect that the trial will conclude by the end of the year and the meaningful costs we've incurred related to this lawsuit should not recur beyond 2021. For the second half of the year, we expect Hyperconnect to contribute $125,000,000 to $135,000,000 of revenue. This outlook reflects some pullback, primarily due to COVID, as well as our decision to focus the Hyperconnect team on delivering video and other technology that we can implement across the rest of our portfolio. We expect at least 2 of our brands to make use of Hyperconnect technology before the end of 2021 and a number of others to implement Hyperconnect capabilities by year end 2022. As a result of this focus on building tech that our other brands can use, we expect Hyperconnect to remain roughly breakeven from an EBITDA standpoint in Q3 and Q4 2021.
For the company as a whole, We expect full year revenue of just above $3,000,000,000 including Hyperconnect, exceeding the high end of our previously stated range. This reflects better than expected performance at our dating brands in the first half of twenty twenty one and anticipates second half year over year growth north of 25%, approximately 20% of Tinder, single digits at the Established Brands and north of 100% at the Emerging Brands, including the contribution from Hyperconnect. From an EBITDA perspective, we now expect a range for the full year of $1,045,000,000 to $1,060,000,000 This outlook incorporates Google's recent change in policy to enable our brands to opt out of mandatory in app billing until at least March 2022. It also includes the previously mentioned additional legal costs and higher spend for government relations and advocacy to encourage the app stores to reduce their fees. We're increasingly confident that the lawsuits and investigations around the globe related to App Store practices will result in changes to those policies in the not too distant future.
We've had an outstanding first half of the year where we've accomplished a great deal. Tinder's growth has accelerated and the product is evolving in exciting ways that we expect will present real revenue opportunities for us over time. Hinge and our other newer established brands newer apps continue to exceed our expectations and our more established brands are performing well. Importantly, our services are now more in demand than ever as people around the world seek social connection online, whether in the form of companionship, romance or love. With Hyperconnect, our portfolio is increasingly well positioned to deliver on our mission of connecting people, which we expect will enable us to continue to deliver strong results for our stakeholders.
With that, I'll ask the operator to open the line for questions.
We will now begin the question and answer session. The first question comes from Cory Carpenter with JPMorgan. Please go ahead.
Thanks for the questions. I had one for Shar and one for Gary. For Shar, on the reopening, hoping you could And a bit on what impact you're seeing to user behavior in markets like the U. S. Where COVID and Delta are flaring up a bit recently.
And then Gary, hoping you could talk about some of the puts and takes driving your expectation for Tinder revenue growth of close to 20% in the second half. Thank you.
Good morning, Corey. Yes, about the delta and case surges. So one of the things to note is More than case surges itself, we're actually watching mobility trends and restrictions more closely Because they seem to have a larger effect. As vaccination rates gain steam, first in the U. S.
And then in Europe, we We saw mobility increase and it reflected in our business trends in Q2. In a few in actually Several markets in Asia, even today, including Japan, which is our 2nd largest revenue market, There are different degrees of lockdowns and restrictions in place and that certainly impacts mobility and our metrics. With respect to what's going on in the U. S. With the delta surges in recent weeks, so far they don't to have any impact on mobility and they may not unless real restrictions are put in place.
And generally, we don't see mask mandates as causing mobility restrictions, mostly partial and full lockdown seem to. So for instance, in UK, where the delta surged and it has already peaked and it's on its way down, Because restrictions were easing during this period, mobility kept increasing and we didn't really see much impact So that's kind of how we think about what's going on in the market today.
And then Corey, as far as our outlook for Tinder revenue in the back half of the year, our outlook sitting here today is for Just north of 20 percent top line growth for Tinder in the second half of twenty twenty one, which is meaningfully higher than what it was last year. If you break it down further into the quarters, I think Q3 growth will probably be just under the 20% mark because last year, if you remember, Q3 was very North America and Europe were coming out of the lockdowns and people got back outside, started being active again. The weather was nice And Asia had the virus under control, so you had really good conditions globally, which led to a strong Q3 last year. For Q4 this year, I'm expecting the growth to be comfortably above 20% year over year. But given Q4 is still a quarter away And Tinder has broad geographic exposure.
The COVID risks that are still out there necessitate us being a little bit conservative. And so that's what you're seeing As we give our outlook for the back half of the year on Tinder growth.
Great. Thank you. The next question comes from Brent Thill with Jefferies. Please go ahead.
Good morning. Maybe if you can just talk to what is giving you confidence to raise your full year guidance from high teens To low 20%, are you assuming some conservatism in the outlook? Jerry, maybe if you can give us a little more color on that and I had a quick follow-up. Thank you.
Sure. Look, we've had an extremely strong start to the year, and that's enabled us to raise our outlook twice so far this year. So we feel great about how we performed in 2021. In fact, Our Q2 was really stellar, 27% revenue growth, well balanced between Tinder and non Tinder. So we feel really good about Q2 in particular.
And I think we're very well set up for the rest of the year. So right now sitting here, I think we have good visibility into Q3 and that is reflected in our specific guidance for the quarter. And then we're anticipating really solid sequential revenue growth going into Q4, which would mean that we should see accelerating year over year Q4 Growth. But as I just said to Corey, there's still some uncertainty in the environment with COVID and Delta and potentially other variants and everything else that people know much about. And so we think that a little bit of conservatism is appropriate, especially the further out that we look.
And so that's all factored into the guidance we've provided.
And Gary, just a follow-up. We wanted to make sure we heard this right, but It sounds like you're assuming Hinge is roughly $250,000,000 in revenue in 2021. Is that somewhat in the ballpark?
So thanks. That's a good question actually. So when you look at that chart that's in the letter related to the Swipe Apps and Plenty of Fish Live and Hinge, It really is impressive what we've been able to achieve getting those businesses from virtually nothing to $300 or so 1,000,000 this year in aggregate. But the letter is a little bit unclear, and so I wanted to clarify that each of the group of Swipe apps as well as The Plenty of Fish live streaming business are contributing at least $50,000,000 of revenue to that $300,000,000 this year. So Hinge is the balance of the 300 after the 2 contributions of 50 plus.
And as we've said before, Hinge is on track to more than double revenue In 2021 after it tripled and we gave the performance for Hinge also in the Q2 of 150% revenue growth. So the 250%, I think is high, But I've given you the components that should enable you, I think, to determine kind of where we think Hinge is going to be roughly for the year.
Great. Thanks. The next question comes from Jason Helfstein with Oppenheimer. Please go ahead.
Thank you, guys. With all the new product initiatives around Tinder, do you see advertising playing a bigger role in the medium term or should we mostly focus on virtual currency and a la carte monetization? Thanks. See and a la carte monetization. Thanks.
I can take that. Thanks, Jason. So we're definitely not looking at advertising as an incremental revenue source. But we do see a la Card is becoming an increasing area of focus in addition to subscriptions. And with regards to virtual Currency, it is something we're testing in a couple of small markets and we tested we started testing it in a couple of small markets in Q2.
It is currently very limited in feature set that it covers. We are encouraged What we've seen so far and will be expanding to additional markets, and more feature coverage over the next few quarters. More broadly though, the Tinder experience, as I said, is evolving to include these new multi dimensional surface areas in the app Where people have new ways to discover and connect and share interests and form communities. And if you think about most The ALC features today, things like Boost and Superlight for instance, they are designed to allow users to stand out in a one to one experience. And we think there are some real interesting revenue opportunities to help people stand out in these many to many experiences on the app that we're building.
Thank you. That's helpful.
The next question comes from Mario Lu with Barclays. Please go ahead.
Great. Thanks for taking the questions. I have 2 on the new payers metric. So specifically at Tinder, it seems like a little over So is this the right way to think about it? And how does the sales payer breakdown look at Hinge and just Match Group overall?
So, this is a little bit complicated. I want to try to run through it to make sure people understand. There are two reasons why payers are higher than average subscribers. The first is that payers captures non subscriber ALC payers. But there's another reason, which is the definitions of average subscribers and payers.
Average subscribers represent a daily average over the quarter, Well, payers is the number of unique payers in a given month and then it's average for the quarter. And so if you look at Match Group overall at our payer numbers, what you'll see is that the non subscriber ALC payers are actually a relatively small part of the difference between average subscribers and payers. It's more a function of the way payers are counted that accounts for payers being higher than average subscribers. So again, ALC payers that our non subscribers are relatively small piece of that disparity. Now that being said, we do think that as we expand our ALC monetization efforts, we add virtual currency, especially in Asia Pacific, and now we bring on Hyper Connect, which has a lot of Non subscriber ALC payers, the percentage of non subscriber ALC payers is going to increase.
So you'll start to see that as we move forward into the year. I'd encourage you to look at the specific definitions which we provided Of average subscribers as well as payers, and if you have further questions on this, we're happy to try to take this offline and go through some examples because I know Intuitively, it's not that obvious. But again, the definitions are what's accounting for a large part of the GAAP.
Okay. Yes, that's helpful. And then just one more on the revenue per payer by GEO. So a little bit surprised to see APAC and other to be relatively in line with Americas and Europe at an absolute level. So just curious if there's any differences in spending By Geeta to point out, for example, does APAC and other tend to spend mostly on a la carte and not on subscription?
Thanks.
Yes. So it's a good question. We have relatively consistent RPP in APAC Compared to the Americas and Europe, which is really a reflection of a couple of things. One is that Pairs in Japan is our highest RPP dating business. So that's definitely helping on the RPP and APAC.
And then we actually have relative price parity between Tinder and APAC Our other geographies, you don't see much of a disparity. And so those two things taken together, as a result, APAC RPP is pretty similar to the rest of the world. As far as kind of what the mix is, Pairs tends to be a subscription business as does Tinder and APAC today. However, as we've talked about, we're experimenting with ways to increase the a la carte consumption At Tinder through virtual currency and other product innovations, we're early days for all of that, but we think we can improve payer penetration by adjusting our monetization strategies. And so that's something that you may very well see over time.
Great. Thank you. Sure.
Next question, please.
The
next question comes from Dan Salmon with BMO Capital Markets. Please go ahead.
Hey, good morning, everyone. I jumped on a little bit late, so hopefully this one wasn't covered. But I just wanted to follow-up on one of the comments In the letter where you spoke about the HyperX Group at Hyperconnect, sounds like a little bit of a lab and I'd love learn just a little bit more about some of the products they're working on currently about the group itself, maybe broad strategic goals, number of employees. And Is that the type of thing that you see as new and incremental to Match that Hyperconnect brings as well?
Sure. Thanks, Jen. I can take this. So generally, as we've said, Hyperconnect has a number of technology We are already planning to deploy on our platforms, video, audio, some AI tools for moderation, etcetera. Within Hyperconnect, HyperX is a technology incubation lab.
And some of the tech assets they've developed Are deployed on Azar and Hakuna. And they also incubate new apps. In fact, Hakuna was a HyperX incubation. I am actually really excited about some of the technology elements they've been working on. AR features, self expression tools, conversational AI And a number of what we would consider metaverse elements, which have the element to transform the online meeting and getting to know each other process.
And so the technology areas of innovation at HyperX is actually very incremental and additive to Match Group. And we do believe it will have a significant impact, both as on their apps as standalone business, but also as a
The next question comes from Shveta Keduriya with Evercore ISI. Please go ahead.
Okay, thank you. Could you please help us understand the guidance for Hyperconnect P? So At the time of acquisition, we were expecting about 40% to 50% growth at revised guidance, slightly less than that. You called out pullback from COVID. Any additional color?
Is that just COVID? Is there a level of conservatism there? And then the follow-up to that is How are you expecting to manage costs at hyperconnect breakeven for the back half, but any additional color on the potential of EBITDA margins for that business would be great? Thank you.
Sure. Why don't I take that one? So We are there are a few things that are leading to somewhat lower growth at Hyperconnect this year than what we expected back in February. The first thing which you rightly pointed out was they have a large footprint in APAC. And as we've talked about and is well documented, COVID has hit APAC much more heavily this year than it did in 2020.
And so there is COVID impact that is being felt In their performance, there is also a much more challenging marketing environment. You've got IDFA, you've got a more crowded marketplace. And so as a result of these factors, the Hyperconnect team has been a bit less aggressive in some of their key markets this year than we were initially anticipating. On top of that, as Shar has talked about, we have become increasingly excited about the opportunities to apply Various hyperconnect technologies to our other platforms and we see significant synergies and upside from that. And so that's become a higher priority for us and for the Hyperconnect team in the short term.
And we've encouraged them to focus resources on the tech integration with Match Group. So we still expect Hyperconnect to perform well this year and post solid revenue growth, but it is going to be a little bit lower than we initially thought. As far as the costs, we communicated that we thought over time margins of Hyperconnect Could get into the upper 20s, 30% range and nothing has really changed our view on that over the longer term. But as I just said, shorter term, we're not focused on margin. We believe the company will still operate at a breakeven pace, But we want to focus on the synergies and so that's what we're focused on certainly for the rest of this year and into next year and then I expect that the margins will gradually start to As we make the turn through 2020 and we'll communicate more about that likely on our next call as we start to get some sense of what we think 2020 is going to 2022, I'm sorry, is going to be for the company.
Okay. Thanks, Gary.
Sure. The next question comes from Justin Patterson with KeyBanc. Please go ahead.
Great. Thank you. One on Established Brands, if I can. What have been the biggest drivers of growth versus 2019 levels? And when you look down the road,
Sure. Thanks, Justin. I can take this. So with the established brands, there are a few different stories here. Keep in mind, the established brands used to be desktop first brands, and they have all reimagined the product as mobile first experiences.
And some of them like Match and Meetic, for instance, have shifted their business model from the hard paywall to more Premium experiences, which has meaningfully increased engagement and conversion. And apps like Poff! Have Added new experiences like Pop! Live, which has created a new revenue stream. OkCupid continues to expand to new international markets.
And generally, they've also sharpened their marketing to become more resonant and relevant to their core audience. So now as they continue to execute, they should be able to expand the category and their core user base And deliver modest growth, we think.
Thank you. The next question comes from Lauren Schenck with Morgan Stanley. Please go ahead.
Great. Thanks. 2 for Gary, if I can. I think you mentioned the Google App Store if you change, that was originally supposed to come into effect in the Q4 being pushed To March of 'twenty two. I think previously you were embedding some impact from that change in the Q4 EBITDA guide.
So just want to confirm that that Upside was sort of flowed through and maybe the $15,000,000 in incremental legal expenses offsetting that, but just want to clarify that. And then generally, how you're feeling about that risk Heading into March next year and any potential workarounds. And then secondly, just if you could give us your thoughts on the status Of the former Tinder employee litigation and how you see that progressing through the course of the year? Thanks.
Sure. So on the Google fees in the Q4, I think what we said previously is that Where we ended up on our EBITDA ranges would be impacted on whether the Google change actually occurred or not. And at this point, they've now about a few weeks ago, they basically said they're pushing back the deadline for compliance until March 31 next year. So that cost is obviously not going to hit us in Q4. And so now what we've done is we've given a more up to date EBITDA outlook the rest of the year, which reflects a lot of puts and takes.
You've got legal and GR costs that you mentioned, and there's more things moving around in there, And then Google is not in there anymore. And so this is our kind of our latest and greatest with everything we know sitting here today factored Frankly, I don't know for sure if that $15,000,000 of extra legal NGR is going to get spent, but we've embedded it. So I think the costs are relatively fully loaded at this point for the rest of the year. Then in terms of potential workarounds, We continue to talk to Google. We have a good relationship with them.
It's very collaborative. And so, we'll see how that all evolves. That being said, as you probably know, there are many, many investigations and lawsuits and regulatory actions around the world in many jurisdictions in many countries related to App Store practices generally. And so as a result of that, We're increasingly optimistic that there's going to be a change in App Store policies one way or another at some point in the not too distant future. And so we'll see where we are as time here progresses, and we'll keep everybody updated on our latest thinking on this.
As far as the Tinder former employee litigation goes, ultimately, it's an ongoing litigation, so there's not too much that we can really I'll provide in terms of details on that. What I can say is that we ran a process that involved 2 globally recognized highly regarded investment banks that listen to everything that There's now plaintiffs in this case had to say about the business, went through an exhaustive analysis and those banks ultimately came up with a valuation of Tinder At the time, that was in line with where Wall Street analysts, like those who are on the phone, thought Tinder was valued. So it wasn't particularly surprising from that standpoint. And so we're confident in our case and that we think their case is completely meritless. And so we're looking forward to getting to the trial later in the fall and fighting this to the end.
And so that's Our plan, and we remain optimistic.
Great. Thank you.
And the last questioner today will be John Blackledge with Cowen. Please go ahead.
Great. Thanks. Just curious if Hinge's 'twenty one top line growth includes non English speaking markets or if those markets are still kind of early stage from a monetization perspective? And also, how does the runway for growth at Hinge look kind of longer term? And do you view Hinge as complementary or cannibalistic or a bit of both to Tinder over time?
Thanks.
Yes, I can take that. So right now Hinge is only available in a few English speaking markets. So much of 2021 revenue growth has largely been a combination of user growth, Concentrated in medium and large cities in these markets, as well as the really good work the team has done So there is still plenty of room for both user and monetization growth in these limited English speaking markets they currently are in. So longer term, it's a combination of further expansion In existing markets, increasing footprint in international markets And continued execution and monetization features that will drive strong growth in the coming years. And we're very excited for what is still to come at Hinge.
It is a uniquely differentiated product that resonates to be deleted resonates with this audience set. We have found very little evidence On cannibalization, Tinder is still the number one dating app for anybody starting out dating, particularly among the young. But Hinge is a great alternative app and a second app for people who are looking for a more Serious intent dating. And so we do think there is a real play for both Tinder and Hinge in our portfolio.
Thank you. I
think that was
Again, the conference call has ended. Thank you for attending today's presentation. You may now disconnect.