RBK : RBC releases financial and operating results for Q4 and FY2013

Moscow, March 28, 2014 - RBC OJSC (Moscow Exchange: RBCM) hereby reports preliminary unaudited financial results for the fourth quarter and full year 2013 and announces key highlights in the company's operating activities in October-December 2013.

"2013 was a transformational year for RBC. In spite of growing competitive pressure from dominant internet players, RBC maintained its leadership position in content-driven internet media in Russia. Consolidated revenue growth for the full year was satisfactory with a 10% year-on-year increase, reflecting good performance in most of our segments. However, due to the weaker market situation, the fourth quarter fell behind expectations with a 5% revenue growth," said Chairman of the Board of Directors and President of RBC Derk Sauer.

"We decided that the time of economic slowdown is the perfect time to transform the company and implement many long awaited changes that comprised a lot of steps on organizational level, strengthening of the management team, and restructuring of corporate debt. All with one clear aim: strengthen the RBС brand and lay the right foundation for future growth. This process took its toll on the EBITDA performance in 2013, but will guarantee improvement of the business and maximization of financial performance going forward," added Derk Sauer.

"I have full confidence in the future of the unique RBС brand and believe that by focusing on core assets our great team will be able to accelerate revenue and margins growth. We have already determined the mid-term development priorities and embarked on the strategy formalization," said Nikolay Molibog - RBC CEO since January 2014.

Financial results for Q4 and FY20131

Revenue, operating expenses and EBITDA. RBC's consolidated revenue edged up 5% to RUB 1.86bn in the fourth quarter. The increase is primarily attributable to Internet and TV segments, as well as to the domains and hosting business. Meanwhile, advertising revenue in the Internet segment rose at the same rate as the Russian advertising market in general, and demonstrated a higher than market average growth in the TV segment . Revenue of RBC's business publications headed south against the backdrop of the general conditions in the printed publications segment registered at the end of the last year. In 2013, RBC's consolidated revenue advanced 10% to RUB 5.59bn.

Operating expenses expanded 37% to RUB 1.79bn in the fourth quarter, due to the restructuring and business reorganization process at RBC. RBC's full-year operating expenses rose 21% to RUB 5.58bn.

The company's EBITDA stood at RUB 76m in the fourth quarter and RUB 12m for January-December 2013.

Internet. RBC's Internet revenue increased 9% to RUB 958m in Q4, due to the implementation of special online projects in cooperation with large clients on business Internet resources and RBC television channel.

As a result of its efforts throughout 2013 aimed at improving the structure, design, and content of its business Internet projects and topical sections on Rbc.ru, the company managed to secure new advertising budgets from niche advertisers (specifically, advertising of sports products on Sport.rbc.ru, real estate on Realty.rbc.ru, and clothes and perfume on Style.rbc.ru). In 2013, RBC's revenue in the Internet segment stood at RUB 2.69bn, up 2% year-on-year.

RBC's aggregate audience totaled 47.4m unique users in December.3

Domains and hosting. RBC's revenue from domain name registration and hosting services rose 7% to RUB 439m in the fourth quarter on the strength of organic growth (6%) in revenue generated by services and consolidation of Reggi's performance following the acquisition of the domain name registrar. In 2013, revenue amounted to RUB 1.53bn, up 31%.

Among new product offerings of the business unit - the service of hosting in France and the USA for the companies targeting European and American users. Also, in the period under review the group conducted a large-scale preparatory work for the launch of the VDS hosting service, dedicated for the hosting of big websites, storage of large amounts of information and testing of applications for different operating systems.

Television. RBC channel's revenue advanced 16% year-on-year in October-December, reaching RUB 353m. The figure for full year 2013 amounted to RUB 999m, up 18% on 2012.

Being the general partner and official broadcaster of the 2014 Sochi Winter Paralympics, RBC channel launched a new project called Sports Willpower that focused on the preparation for the Games and problems that people with disabilities face in Russia. In addition, the programming grid was expanded by adding new programs: Book forest (a program about books and literary pursuits hosted by Viktor Erofeev featuring outstanding businessmen and cultural figures), Asia (a program about the economy of South-East Asia hosted by Nikolay Velichko), New Legends (success stories of young entrepreneurs), business reality show Challenge (an educational program for young entrepreneurs), and Evtukhov.Industry (a program about various aspects of Russia's foreign trade hosted by Viktor Evtukhov ).

RBC channel's monthly audience in Russia expanded 11% during the year, reaching 22.6m viewers in December, while its average daily audience stood at 3.2m viewers at the end of the year (up 22% year-on-year).

Business press. Revenue from RBC's printed business publications declined 35% to RUB 111m in the fourth quarter. This is partly attributable to the ban on alcohol advertising in printed media imposed in the beginning of 2013, which meant the absence of alcohol advertising in RBC's printed publications in the fourth quarter 2013 compared to the large amount of such advertising in the same period last year. Nevertheless, RBC managed to partially offset these losses by advertising revenues from other product categories. Full-year 2013 revenue in the business press segment reached RUB 369m.

In 2013, RBC daily firmed up its positions as the second-largest printed business daily and the largest online business newspaper in terms of audience. RBC magazine confirmed its status as a leading business magazine in Moscow.

1 RBC's management report does not include financial results of RBK Money payment system (sold in 2012) and Salon Press Publishing House (sold in 2013).
2 Russian media market's advertising growth rate in Q4 calculated on the basis of data provided by the Russian Association of Communication Agencies
3 Audience statistics in the press release are provided in accordance with TNS data.

Investor contacts:
Maria Sorokina, Marina Stafeeva
Tel: +7 (495) 363-1111
Email: ir@rbc.ru
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