On Wednesday, Chinese gaming and social media giant Tencent Holdings Ltd reported a forecast-beating 175 per cent rise in quarterly profit. The world’s largest gaming firm by revenue booked profit of 59.3 billion yuan ($9.09 billion) for the three months through December. That was ahead of an average analyst estimate of 30.65 billion yuan, based on data from Refinitiv.

Revenue rose 26 per cent to 133.67 billion yuan, versus market expectations of 132.19 billion yuan. Tencent, which has benefited from a surge in paying users for video games in China and international markets, said online games revenues grew by 36 per cent.

ByteDance outbid Tencent last week to acquire Shanghai-based gaming studio Moonton Technology, which is most famous for its Southeast Asia sensation Mobile Legends. Tencent is also locked in litigation battles with ByteDance, which accused of monopolistic behaviour, while Tencent said ByteDance “illegally obtains WeChat users’ personal information”. China’s tech giants have been faced this year by an unprecedented antitrust crackdown by authorities, which analysts fear could target other internet behemoths after first focusing on billionaire Jack Ma’s Alibaba business empire. Tencent’s founder Pony Ma met with China’s antitrust watchdog officials this month to discuss compliance at his group, Reuters reported earlier, citing two people with direct knowledge of the matter.