International online recruitment platform provider HeadHunter Group NYSE: HHR stock has been climbing on its triple-digit top-line growth. The Moscow-based company has a large footprint in the Russian online recruitment market. Just as the U.S. is experiencing a post-pandemic jobs boom in a tight labor market, Russia and international countries are experiencing the same demand for talent amid tight supply. The spread of COVID-19 vaccinations has boosted the labor market according to the HeadHunter Group CEO. In fact, the Company is seeing a 240% rise in job postings due to the “unprecedentedly high demand for labor and labor supply.” The Company is converting clients to a subscription model in addition to integrating its recent acquisitions to grow market share. Prudent investors seeking exposure in the Russian jobs market strength can watch for opportunistic pullbacks in shares of HeadHunter Group.
Q2 FY 2021 Earnings Release
On Aug. 16, 2021, Headhunter Group released its fiscal second-quarter 2021 results for the quarter ending June 2021. The Company reported an earnings-per-share (EPS) profit of $24.29 RUB excluding non-recurring items versus consensus analyst estimates for a profit of $21.36 RUB, a $2.93 RUB beat. Revenues grew 155% year-over-year (YoY) to $3.91 billion RUB beating analyst estimates for $3.43 billion RUB. The Company acquired job platforms Zarplata.ru and Skillaz. Net income rose 435.1% YoY. HeadHunter Group CEO Mikhail Zhukov commented, “We had an exceptionally strong quarter, where we demonstrated the scalability of our business model and our commitment to long-term product development. We look forward to remaining the most effective digital recruitment solution for many thousands of clients as they recover from last year’s turbulence and now face an unprecedented labor supply scarcity.”
Upside Guidance
The Company raised its full-year 2021 revenue guidance to $13.50 billion RUB to $13.91 billion RUB (up 63% to 68%) from $12.58 RUB billion analyst estimates.
Conference Call Takeaways
CEO Zhukov set the tone, “Halfway through 2021, I'm increasingly optimistic about the strength of our business. Driven by fundamental market trends, we are currently seeing dramatic corporate activity in the current market. This is evidenced by the historical highest number of vacancies on our platform and the record intake of new customers. As a result, our total paying customer base in the first half of 2021 exceeded 300,000. Along with customer base expansion, we have completed the migration of our users to the new pricing model for subscriptions, allowing us to improve monetization and set the ground for its future enhancement. I'm also excited about our product development in the second quarter. For example, we released to millions of our users and in-platform functionality of direct and instant communication between candidates and employers. Chats and messengers are becoming an increasingly important way people consume various digital products. So, we're focusing here on integrating recruitment into broadly used interfaces. And as an example, we launched cross-posting options for our clients to advertise their vacancies across their broad platform, thereby extending their candidate outreach. All these are crucial steps in order to help our clients to succeed in this challenging labor market situation.”
Chief Strategy Officer Comments
HeadHunter Group CSO Dmitry Sergienkov added, “s Mikhail said, we are very happy to report that our business continued to gain strong momentum and significantly accelerated in the second quarter, delivering across all strategic priorities. Again, for a little comparison base, last year, our revenue in Q2 was up 165% year-on-year, driven by average consumption growth, accelerated intake of new small and medium businesses, monetization rollout and full consolidation of new assets acquired. Despite some diluting effects from Skillaz as product consolidation, we improved over profitability with adjusted EBITDA margin came above 57%, our CapEx comprised just 2.3% of revenues, contributing to our strong cash flow generation over the quarter. Turning now to our results by customer segment; as a result of our guiding growth and acquisition of Zarplata, we have increased our customer base by circa 125,000 customers and yet over the first half of 2021, we already have more clients than the entire pre-COVID 2019. During the second quarter, almost all client categories demonstrated triple-digit revenue growth, with small and medium business segments being mostly driven by customer base expansion, both organic and inorganic, while key account segments also reported strong ARPC growth, this growth will be explained by the target.”
HHR Opportunistic Pullback Levels
Using the rifle charts on the weekly and daily time frames provides a precision view of the price action playing field for HHR stock. The weekly rifle chart peaked off the $58.03 Fibonacci (fib) level. The weekly 5-period moving average (MA) support sits at $52.56 flat with a rising 15-period MA at $49.71. The weekly stochastic can either cross up to confirm a pup breakout or mini inverse pup back down. The bullish case is a weekly stochastic cross-up to trigger the weekly market structure low (MSL) buy signal on a breakout through $58.07. This would target the weekly upper Bollinger Bands (BBs) at $63.04. The daily rifle chart shows a channel tightening as peaked out shares pull back on the falling 5-period MA at $54.73 as the 15-period MA continues to rise at $52.31. The daily stochastic is also pulling back under the 70-band. Prudent investors can monitor for opportunistic pullback levels at the $53.14 fib, $52.49 fib, $50.69 fib, $49.31 fib, $48.22 fib, and the $47.14 fib. Upside trajectories range from the $62.53 fib upwards to the $83.23 fib level.
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