RenRen.com, in First Results Since IPO, Shows a Net Loss in 2011 Q1

Renren.com, China’s biggest Facebook-style social network, has released its 2011 Q1 financial results. Being the first such results since their May IPO, a lot of investors in Renren Inc. (NYSE: RENN) will be looking for glimmers of hope in their declining stock – see the stocks gadget, below – beyond the glaring net loss of US$2.6 million.

What are those rays of sunshine? Well, those net losses were down 78.5% from last year, before their IPO, whilst net revenues were up 46.6% to US$20.6 million, and online advertising revenues were up 100.5% to US$8.1 million.

Renren’s CEO, Joseph Chen, was upbeat, describing the company’s Q1 as a “robust first quarter, in particular the doubling of our advertising revenues.” In further statements accompanying the unaudited results, Hui Huang, Renren’s CFO, commented, “Our company is still in the early stages of monetization. We … [are] investing significantly in research and development, sales and marketing, and strategic acquisitions and business partnerships.”

What that means is that Renren.com is trying to remain nimble, and not lose users to short-but-sweet microblogs, such as Sina Weibo or Tencent Weibo. Fortunately for Renren, user growth continued, with monthly unique logins up from 23 million to 33 mil by the end of May 2011.

Renren is not alone is being a major Chinese IPO’d firm which can’t break into profit – top video-sharing site Youku, which has much higher operating costs, has been posting bigger losses since its inception.

Stats source: Renren’s official statement; Image source: Reuters/Adam Au