Roblox Slumps on Soft Bookings for March

Roblox (NYSE: RBLX) shares slumped Monday after the California-based video game maker disclosed user metrics for the last month.

Roblox said it attracted 66.2 million daily active users (DAUs), representing a 26% increase year-over-year (YoY). However, the number came in below 67.3 million DAUs reported for February.

Hours engaged on the platform also increased by 26% YoY to 4.8 billion. Estimated bookings grew 27% YoY to $247-255 million while expected revenue for March is seen at $212-223 million (up 15-21% YoY).

“We estimate that the impact of foreign currency fluctuations led to a reduction of approximately 2% in the year-over-year growth rate for both March 2023 revenue and bookings,” the company said in a press release.

Moreover, the company expects average bookings per daily active user (ABPDAU) to be between $3.73 and $3.85, which represents a YoY change of -2% – +1%.

Roblox also confirmed it will cease publishing monthly metrics and will instead provide updates about certain key metrics on a quarterly basis. 

Shares of the company surged in February after the video game business reported a 17% jump in bookings YoY. The shared forecast implied a 19-21% annual growth in bookings, which also came in better than analyst expectations. 

“Growth was strong across all geographies and age groups with particular strength among users above 17 years old,” said Roblox CFO, Michael Guthrie in a statement.

For the December quarter, Roblox reported a loss per share of $0.48 on bookings of $899.4 million. Analysts were expecting a loss per share of $0.52 on revenue of $881.4 million. The number of DAUs at the end of December was 58.8 million, which then rose to 65 million in January. 

Despite solid, stable growth in DAUs, investors likely expected stronger bookings for March.