Hello, I'm Jeffrey from Kakao's IR. We will now begin Kakao's 2026 second quarter earnings conference call.

Today, I am joined by Shina Chung, the CEO, and Jayden Shin, the CFO. Please be reminded that the earnings results are consolidated estimates under the K-IFRS basis, and are subject to change upon the auditor's review.

Also, forward-looking estimates are based on assumptions, actual results may differ from figures included in today's presentation. Now, we will have a presentation from the CEO Shina Chung.

Good morning, this is Shina, CEO of Kakao. In the internet and mobile eras, the attention economy focused on capturing users' attention primarily through advertising was a key theme.

In the coming era of agentic AI, however, we expect a full-scale shift toward intention economy, where new value is created in the process of understanding users' intents and completing actions. Amid this major transition, Kakao aims to make the agentic AI user experience a habit.

Kakao plans to provide a new form of agentic AI experience that identifies users' intent within the context of their conversations, recommends various types of actions based on the identified intent, and enables agents to carry out those actions on their behalf. In particular, our goal is for this use of AI not to remain a one-time experience, but to become a new user habit that is repeated in everyday life.

As the first step in delivering a new agentic AI experience, we continue to actively enhance the on-device AI models that we have consistently emphasized, enabling them to capture not only explicit intent, but also intent embedded within conversational context, while further deepening their overall understanding of users. Our recently introduced Kanana 2 1.3B model delivers superior performance compared with global open source models in areas that are essential for operating real-world AI services, including conversation, knowledge, instruction following, and tool calling, despite its significantly smaller parameter size.

This lightweight model is already being used across Kakao's AI services, including Kanana in KakaoTalk, conversation summary, call summary, and the AI national secretary. We have also open-sourced the model on Hugging Face, making it available for anyone to download and run.

At the same time, we are continuing to enhance the long-term memory capabilities of our on-device AI models. With this enhanced long-term memory capabilities, Kanana in KakaoTalk will move beyond understanding only fragments of conversations.

Instead, it will understand users' schedules and interests scattered across multiple conversations within a single context, enabling it to identify users' intent with greater accuracy. Furthermore, the longer users engage with Kanana in KakaoTalk, the more their behavior patterns and preferences accumulate, enabling us to deliver increasingly personalized services.

As we continue to enhance our ability to understand users' intent, we believe that the key factor in making the new AI experience a habit is how far we can expand agentic actions that lead all the way to real-world actions and transactions across users' everyday lives. Kakao has prioritized partnerships with top-tier players in verticals that users engage with frequently in their daily lives, and where AI agents' suggestions and recommendations can naturally lead to real actions and transactions.

Among these verticals, the first to be integrated into Kakao's agentic AI ecosystem is food delivery, and today we are announcing our A2A partnership with Coupang Eats. Once Coupang Eats is connected to Kanana in KakaoTalk through an agent-to-agent integration, the on-device AI model with KakaoTalk will identify users' intent to order food based on the conversational context, recommend menu items based on the preferences it has accumulated over time, and enable users to complete the entire ordering and payment process naturally within the chat room.

The two companies are currently engaged in detailed discussions across multiple areas to ensure that agentic AI experience within KakaoTalk can lead all the way to actual transactions, and we plan to bring the services to market in the near future. At first glance, this may appear to be simply addition of food ordering feature within KakaoTalk.

However, we believe it is meaningful because it represents the first step toward establishing a new user habit, where AI understands the user intent, connects it to real-world actions, and helps users complete recurring everyday tasks through AI. Building on this, Kakao's AI ecosystem will expand into verticals that users engage with frequently in their daily lives, including commerce, reservations, travel, and payments.

Across these verticals, we aim to build compelling reference cases through direct partnerships with players that occupy the top of consumers' minds in Korea. At the same time, we also plan to actively leverage PlayMCP to expand the ecosystem more rapidly.

Today, PlayMCP already hosts more than 3,400 MCP tools, generating over 100,000 calls per day. Just as the App Store grew in the early days of mobile era, not only through major apps, but also through a wide range of everyday apps created by individual developers, the MCP ecosystem is likewise expanding to include MCP tools provided by both large enterprises and independent developers.

We plan to identify the capabilities that we believe can become part of users' daily lives and integrate them into Kanana in KakaoTalk, thereby expanding both the scope and the value of AI agent within KakaoTalk. At the same time, by connecting Kakao's established authentication system and secure payment infrastructure, we aim to build an ecosystem that is both stronger and faster to scale.

In the second half of the year, we are preparing to gradually introduce new agentic AI experiences within KakaoTalk. In the mobile era, the dominant interface was the GUI, where users navigated fixed screens and manually tapped buttons.

As we enter the AI era, however, the interface is evolving into the LUI, or language user interface, where users interact with agents through natural language, such as the text and voice. KakaoTalk already has an LUI-based communication channel in the form of chat rooms, where users send messages and images to their friends.

This makes it possible to transform the chat room into the prompt interface, where users can simply make requests to AI agents or easily create their own AI skills. In addition, we plan to expand AI interactions beyond text so that users can also communicate with AI through voice, just as they would with a real colleague.

Building on the reliability that KakaoTalk has maintained over the years, we will continue to evolve the platform so that it can seamlessly support everything from authentication and permissions to memory, AI tools, payments, and connections between agents. In the second half of this year, while pursuing multiple initiatives in parallel, we expect the number of monthly active users who begin engaging with AI services within KakaoTalk to exceed 10 million by end of the year.

Looking at our second quarter results, the strength of Kakao's platform competitiveness drove growth across the platform business, from advertising and commerce and mobility and pay. As a result, profit growth outpaced revenue growth, with both consolidated revenue and operating profit reaching record quarterly highs.

This demonstrates that the stable growth and profitability of our existing platform business are providing us with a solid financial foundation to continue making efficient investments in AI. In the era of agentic AI, the key competitive advantage will no longer be who builds the better model, but who can most naturally embed AI into users' everyday lives and connect it to real-world actions.

In this new competitive landscape, Kakao is well-positioned to deliver the best agentic AI experience, having already established a strong user touchpoints and a broad service ecosystem. Combining both the direction of our AI strategy and the speed of execution, we expect to establish the foundation for the mass adoption of AI by the end of this year and begin meaningful monetization starting next year.

As we have previously shared, in addition to transaction fees from agentic commerce and subscription revenue from AI services, we also expect a new category of AI advertising revenue, something that Kakao has not had before, to begin contributing in earnest. By 2028, we expect AI-related revenue within KakaoTalk Biz to expand rapidly into double-digit percentage of Talk Biz revenue, making AI both the key driver of renewed Talk Biz growth and one of our major revenue streams.

Kakao transformed everyday life in the mobile era. Kakao is now a pioneer in the AI era as a first mover, leading the mass adoption of AI so that everyone can have their own AI agent.

Throughout this transformation, AI is not only one-time initiative for Kakao, but the foundation of our sustainable growth. That is why we are designing the future with safety as our top priority.

Building on the many initiatives and investments we have made over years, we will continue to introduce innovative AI services step by step, establish AI as a new growth engine, and ultimately enhance shareholder value. We sincerely appreciate your continued support.

Next, Jayden, our CFO, will present the 2026 second quarter financial results.

Hello, this is Jayden. I will now present Kakao's consolidated financial results for the second quarter.

Consolidated revenue for the second quarter was 2 trillion 99 billion won, up 9% YoY and 8% QoQ. Platform revenue reached 1 trillion 230 billion won, growing 17% YoY and 7% QoQ.

First, revenue for Talk Biz, Kakao's core business, was 643 billion won, up 12% YoY and 2% QoQ. Second quarter Talk Biz advertising and subscription revenue reached a quarterly record high of 400 billion won, growing 14% and 11% QoQ.

Starting with business message, revenue grew 20% YoY, supported by solid demand from financial advertisers. Advertisers that previously used messages mainly to deliver information are increasingly expanding their use of messages for marketing purposes.

As a result, total message volume continues to rise, and we expect revenue growth to remain solid throughout the second half. Moving on to display ads, following a revenue classification this quarter, I will discuss Talk DA and network ads separately.

Talk DA, which covers display ads served within KakaoTalk, grew 28% YoY. Growth was driven by higher user activity centered on feed-based services and solid performance from new ad products.

For reference, on the same basis, Talk DA grew 19% YoY in the first quarter, indicating that growth accelerated further QoQ. In the second half, we plan to further expand commerce-related ads and diversify our ad products to capture demand from a broader range of advertisers.

Through these efforts, we expect to continue attracting new advertisers while encouraging existing advertisers to increase their budgets. By contrast, network ads revenue, which covers inventory outside KakaoTalk, declined 45% YoY.

This was due to lower traffic on certain platforms and changes in advertising strategy. In the second half, we plan to strengthen the revenue base by expanding our product portfolio and diversifying our media partners.

Beginning next year, we expect revenue to gradually recover and return to a stable growth trajectory. Moving on to commerce, second quarter total commerce GMV was 2 trillion 700 billion won, up 9% YoY, but down 5% QoQ.

Talk Gift maintained solid growth by strengthening its product lineup in luxury beauty, food, and baby and kids categories, while expanding promotions to capture demand during Korea's Family Month in May. As a result, GMV for all key gifting occasions reached record highs.

As mentioned last quarter, expanding self-purchases is one of Talk Gift's key growth initiatives this year. In the second quarter, self-purchase GMV grew 39% YoY.

Along with an inflow of new users, purchase frequency among existing users also increased, confirming the effectiveness of our strategy. Self-purchases currently account for around 20% of total Talk Gift GMV.

Given the significant room for further growth, we expect self-purchases to remain a key driver of Talk Gift's growth going forward. For Talk Store, we made promotions more regular and expanded collaborations with major brands to increase user visits and purchase frequency.

As the number of buyers, payment transactions, and average order value all increased, GMV grew 7% YoY. Commerce revenue recorded 243 billion won, up 10% YoY.

Growth was driven by higher GMV at Talk Gift and Talk Store, strong 1P sales, and the recognition this quarter of a portion of GMV from the Shopping Festa held in March. Commerce revenue declined 10% QoQ, reflecting the high base from Lunar New Year demand in the first quarter.

Platform and other revenue reached 587 billion won, up 22% YoY and 12% QoQ. Starting with mobility, solid performance from its existing business was complemented by strong growth in last-mile logistics.

As a result, both revenue and operating profit continued to grow at a healthy pace. For Kakao Pay, financial service revenue grew significantly, supported by increased trading activity in both domestic and overseas equities.

Payment and platform services also maintained double-digit growth, enabling Pay to achieve record high quarterly revenue and operating profit. Moving on to the content segment, second quarter content revenue was 868 billion won, up 1% YoY and 10% QoQ.

First, story revenue was 211 billion won, down 16% YoY and broadly flat QoQ. Piccoma's revenue in yen declined 9% YoY as a slowdown in Japan's manga market continued.

The second quarter includes Golden Week, Japan's major extended holiday and the manga market's biggest seasonal peak. During this quarter, Piccoma carried out active marketing activities to mark its 10th anniversary and introduced new short-form animated video content.

As a result, Piccoma maintained its number one position in gross revenue across Japan's overall app market, both in the second quarter and for the first half of 2026. In the second half, Piccoma will continue sourcing high-quality titles and strengthening its lineup to enhance the competitiveness of its core business.

At the same time, it will work to build traction for its newly launched short-form animation and merchandise businesses. Through these efforts, Piccoma will expand its business across the full IP lifecycle, from sourcing and distribution to downstream IP commercialization, while developing new growth drivers.

Meanwhile, Kakao Entertainment's story business saw slight QoQ increases in both domestic platform GMV and revenue. This was supported by visible results from its strategy of expanding popular web novel IPs into webtoons.

Next, music revenue reached 558 billion won, up 8% YoY and 15% QoQ. YoY growth was driven by expanded concert activities by major artists, together with higher MD and licensing revenue.

QoQ growth was driven by increased album sales and MD revenue following comebacks by anchor artists, including aespa and NCT WISH. Lastly, media revenue was 99 billion won, up 5% YoY and 7% QoQ, reflecting an increase in the number of titles under production.

Next, regarding operating expenses, second quarter operating expenses were 1 trillion 821 billion won, up 6% YoY and 5% QoQ. Labor costs increased only 2% YoY as we maintained a conservative hiring stance.

They remained broadly flat QoQ at 448 billion won. Marketing expenses reached 97 billion won, up 22% YoY and 33% QoQ, reflecting expanded marketing activities at Piccoma and Kakao Pay.

For reference, marketing expenses accounted for 5% of consolidated revenue in the second quarter. Cost of revenue was 746 billion won, up 10% YoY and 6% QoQ.

This was due to higher production costs following expanded activities by major music artists. Despite continued growth in infrastructure demand, we are effectively managing cost increases through efficient investment and operations.

As a result, outsourcing and infrastructure costs increased only 2% YoY and rose 7% QoQ to 223 billion won. Depreciation and amortization expenses were 192 billion won, down 8% YoY and 3% QoQ.

The decline reflected the base effects from content license amortization and one-off bad debt expenses. Consequently, second quarter consolidated operating profit was 277 billion won, up 36% YoY and 31% QoQ.

The operating margin was 13%, improving by approximately 3 percentage points YoY. For reference, standalone operating profit for the second quarter was 126 billion won, up 17% YoY.

The standalone operating margin improved by approximately 1 percentage point to 18%. Moving on to non-operating items, second quarter non-operating income was 87 billion won, increasing by 51 billion won YoY, reflecting a gain on disposal from the sale of AX.

On a QoQ basis, non-operating income decreased by 34 billion won due to lower equity-method income and lower dividend income following the disposal of investment stakes. Second quarter consolidated net income was 18 billion won.

The gap between operating profit and net income this quarter was attributable to a one-off loss from discontinued operations arising from the process of simplifying our governance structure, as well as income tax expense. These items should be viewed separately from the operating performance of continuing operations.

Profit before income tax from continuing operations was 364 billion won. After reflecting the one-off income tax impact, consolidated net income from continuing operations was 199 billion won.

Lastly, total capex for the second quarter was 188 billion won. This consisted of 165 billion won in PP&E and 24 billion won in intangible assets.

Capex increased by 89 billion won YoY and 70 billion won QoQ as server purchases required for the full year were concentrated in the second quarter. This concludes the presentation on the second quarter earnings of 2026.

We will now proceed to the Q&A session. As time is limited, we kindly ask that you limit your questions to two per person.

지금부터 질의응답을 시작하겠습니다. 질문을 하실 분은 전화기 버튼에 별표와 1번을 누르시기 바랍니다.

질문을 취소하시려면 별표와 2번을 누르시면 됩니다.

Good morning, and thank you for taking my question. I would like to submit two questions this morning.

I understand, and also you've mentioned this in your opening presentation, in order for you to actually create an AI agentic-based ecosystem, you were planning on partnering up with external vertical service players. Compared to the schedule that you've shared with us during the previous earnings call, it seems like there's been a bit of a delay.

Would like to know as to why that is the case. Can you also update us on where the status is at this point, and if you could lead a possible launching schedule going forward, that would also be very helpful.

My second question relates to your Kanana in KakaoTalk and ChatGPT in Kakao. Would like you to share with us some of the user metrics and engagement metrics, and what your strategies are going forward to improve those metrics.

네, 두 가지 질문은 제가 답변드리겠습니다. 일단 첫 번째

AI 에이전트 외부 파트너 연동 지연에 대해서 조금 설명드리고자 합니다. 카카오가 구현하고자 하는 에이전틱 AI는 단순히 외부 API를 연결하는 수준이 아니라 대화 맥락을 바탕으로 AI가 적절한 서비스를 제안하고 인증부터 주문과 결제까지 하나의 사용자 흐름 안에서 완결하는 새로운 이용자 경험입니다.

이를 위해서는 파트너가 기존 서비스의 강점을 유지하면서도 AI 에이전트가 자연스럽게 개입할 수 있도록 서비스 구조와 이용자 경험을 다시 설계하고, 또 거래 과정에서 양사의 역할과 책임뿐만 아니라 사업 모델과 운영 기준까지 함께 맞추는 과정이 필요합니다. 에이전트가 플랫폼의 경계를 넘어서 외부 서비스의 주문과 결제에 관여하고, 이를 실제 거래로 연결하는 방식은 글로벌에서도 아직 충분히 검증되지 않은 영역입니다.

This is Shina, I will be responding to the two questions that you've asked. First, in regards to Kanana in KakaoTalk and ChatGPT and Kakao, agentic AI that is envisioned by Kakao is not simply connecting to external APIs, but it is one that creates new user experience in which AI makes suggestions and recommends services within the context of the conversation, and completing the flow all the way across authentication and up to ordering and payment process.

In order for this to happen, partners' service strength and competitiveness has to stay intact, and that is why we need to redesign service architecture and user experience to allow AI to naturally intervene into the scene. That is why we also need to go through process to align R&R, roles and responsibility of each of the respective companies, and also match baseline for business model and operations.

Now, this approach is yet to be proven even in the global market, as the agent goes beyond the boundaries of the platform, and has to be incorporated into the off-platform ordering and payment processes and make that connections to real-world activities. 따라서 첫 번째 파트너십은 단순한 연결이 아니라 일상과 밀접한 서비스에서 에이전틱

AI가 이용자의 의도를 실제 행동과 거래까지 연결하는 모습을 보여줄 수 있어야 한다고 판단했습니다. 특히 배달 영역의 경우 이용 빈도가 높고 이용자의 관여도가 상대적으로 낮아서 여러 정보를 깊이 탐색하기보다 빠르고 편리하게 주문과 결제까지 이어지는 경험의 가치가 큰 만큼, 에이전틱 AI의 효용을 가장 명확하게 보여줄 수 있다고 생각합니다.

Through our initial partnership, we felt that it is very important to show how agentic AI actually works in connection-to-action thesis in everyday services. We felt that delivery service was most appropriate because of high frequency of usage by the user base and relatively lower user intervention that is required along the process, because experience and value is mostly placed on how fast and convenient the process is, rather than having to conduct in-depth information searching.

In creating the most optimal experience, we wanted to be able to validate the convenience, and we felt that this would actually show the utility of agentic AI the best. 최적의 이용자 경험을 만들어가는 과정에서 카카오는 에이전틱

AI의 사업성과 확장 가능성을 처음으로 검증해 보고자 합니다. 이용자의 의도가 실제 주문과 결제로 이어지고 파트너의 신규 고객 유입과 거래액 증가로 확인된다면, 이는 후속 파트너 확대와 에이전틱 AI 생태계 확장을 가속화하는 강력한 근거가 될 것입니다.

이 과정에서 축적한 경험과 운영 노하우를 바탕으로 에이전트 간 역할과 호출 방식은 A2A 기반의 공통 연동 구조로 발전을 시키고, 또 한편 인증과 권한 위임, 주문과 결제처럼 반복적으로 필요한 기능은 SDK와 에이전트 빌더로 제공할 계획입니다.

In creating the most optimal experience, we want to be the first to validate the scalability and business feasibility of agentic AI business. User intent and connecting that to ordering and payment process, we are able to generate, I believe, through this process new customer acquisition for our partner companies and also drive GMV growth, and this will become strong basis for scaling agentic AI ecosystem as well as our partner base.

Based on such experience and operational know-how, we will develop A2A-based integration structure, supporting role of the agents and also the call method, and repeatable features like authentication, delegation, and ordering and payment will be offered in the form of SDKs and agent builders. 이를 통해 후속 파트너들은 보다 적은 비용과 개발 리소스로 최적의 에이전틱

AI 경험을 구현할 수 있을 것으로 기대하고, 생태계 역시 PlayMCP를 활용해 더욱 빠르게 확장될 것으로 예상합니다.

For our subsequent partners, we believe that they can implement this optimal agentic AI experience very quickly with less cost and development resources, while the ecosystem scales much faster leveraging PlayMCP. 두 번째로 질문 주신 카나나 인 카카오톡과

챗GPT 포 카카오 현황에 대해 말씀드리겠습니다. 먼저 카나나 인 카카오톡은 실제 이용 데이터를 얼마나 빠르게 서비스에 반영하는가가 AI 서비스의 경쟁력을 좌우하는 만큼, 정식 출시 이후 이용자 반응과 사용 데이터를 바탕으로 평균 2주마다 개선 사항을 배포하면서 기능과 이용 경험의 완성도를 높이고 있습니다.

Now let me move on to the second part of this question on the update on AI services and our plans to expand on user engagement. Looking at Kanana in KakaoTalk and ChatGPT for Kakao, firstly, for Kanana in KakaoTalk, since its release, we've been releasing enhancements on average of every 2 weeks based on user feedback and incorporating data usage, as we further refine user experience.

Because competitiveness, we believe, it will be determined by how fast we incorporate actual usage data to our services. 판톡과 답변의 피드백을 남긴 이용자의 데이터를 보면 긍정적으로 평가한 비중은 각각

80%와 90%를 넘어서고 있습니다. 그중에서도 대화 맥락을 바탕으로 검색과 쇼핑, 그리고 로컬 서비스에 대한 이용자의 의도를 파악해 제안하는 기능에 대해 평가가 특히 높게 나타나고 있습니다.

이처럼 이용자가 실질적인 효용을 체감하는 영역을 중심으로 하여 서비스 경험이 개선되면서 반복 사용도 늘어나고, 현재 이용자 리텐션은 출시 초기 70% 수준에서 80%에 근접하고 있습니다.

The results show that of the users who left positive feedback on proactive message and the responses were above 80% and 90% respectively. In particular, we see high ratings for intent-based recommendations within the context of the conversation for search, shopping, and local place services.

With users seeing how useful it is, we are also seeing increase in repeat and recurring usages on the back of better service experience, and so user retention has moved close to 80% versus 70%, which was immediately after the release. 앞으로는 대화 맥락 속 이용자의 의도를 보다 정확하게 파악하는 한편, 배달 플랫폼 연동을 시작으로 에이전트가 이용자의 의도를 실제 주문과 결제까지 연결하는 경험을 확대해 나갈 계획입니다.

이처럼 이용자가 카나나 인 카카오톡을 일상에서 지속적으로 사용할 이유가 충분히 마련되는 시점부터 구체적인 활용 사례를 중심으로 마케팅을 본격화할 계획에 있습니다. 이를 통해서 신규 이용자를 빠르게 늘리고, 첫 사용이 자연스럽게 반복 사용으로 이어지도록 서비스 경험도 지속적으로 개선해 나가겠습니다.

We plan to expand on intent-to-action conversion, connecting all the way up to ordering and making payments, starting with our endeavor with the delivery platform, and make sure users' intents are precisely captured within the conversational context so as to build on that experience. We will also start implementing marketing in full swing around key use cases when it becomes clear that we have fully laid the basis to drive sustainable usage of Kanana in KakaoTalk as part of people's daily lives.

We will quickly increase new user acquisitions, and will enhance service experience so their first try can lead to repeated usage.

챗GPT 포 카카오 역시 2분기 기준 약 1,300만 명의 누적 가입자를 확보하면서, 이제는 가입자 규모보다 사용성과 활동성이 더욱 중요한 단계에 진입했습니다. 실제로 이용자당 1일 평균 발신 메시지 수는 6건을 넘어섰고, 분기 말 기준 1일 평균 체류 시간도 8분에 가까워지면서, 가입자 기반을 확대하는 단계를 넘어 활동성이 본격적으로 높아지고 있습니다.

이런 흐름을 더욱 확대하기 위해 최근 업데이트를 통해 카카오톡 대화방에서 챗GPT를 챗봇으로 불러와 바로 질문하고 답변을 대화 상대와 공유할 수 있도록 했고, PC까지 지원 범위를 확대해 이용자 접점을 크게 넓혔습니다. 이를 통해서 이용자가 궁금한 것이 생겼을 때 톡 내 어디에서든 편리하게 챗GPT로 활용하고 대화와 공유를 통해서 자연스럽게 확산해 나가도록 하겠습니다.

ChatGPT for Kakao in the second quarter had a reported 13 million cumulative subscribers, we're now in a phase where activity and usability metrics is more important than subscriber numbers. Daily average outbound message per user now exceeds more than 6 messages, and daily average time spent is close to 8 minutes as of the end of the quarter, showing very clear uptrend in activity as we move beyond subscriber expansion stage.

To further facilitate this trajectory, in recent updates we enabled the feature where ChatGPT can be called into the chat room like a chatbot, and people can ask questions and share the responses with others in that chat room. We expanded this to the PC platform as well, further scaling the touch point.

This will help people to use ChatGPT seamlessly wherever they are within KakaoTalk whenever they have any questions, and we will try to spread such usage as part of the conversational scene and through the sharing. 하반기에는 카나나 인 카카오톡에 에이전틱

AI 경험을 본격화하고 챗GPT 포 카카오의 이미지 생성과 챗봇 기능을 지속적으로 고도화하면서 톡 내 AI 서비스 이용을 더욱 확대하겠습니다. 현재 나타나는 이용자 지표와 향후 서비스 확장 계획을 감안하면, 올해 연말까지 톡 내에서 AI 서비스를 친숙하게 접하기 시작하는 월간 활성 이용자를 1천만 명까지 확대하는 목표도 충분히 달성 가능하다고 보고 있습니다.

In the second half of the year, we will further drive agentic AI experience of Kanana in KakaoTalk, and also enhance image generation and chatbot features of ChatGPT for Kakao, as we further scale AI services embedded in the Talk platform. In light of user metrics that we are seeing at this point and future plans on our service expansion, we think we can achieve 10 million MAU by the end of the year as people become accustomed to such services.

다음 질문 받겠습니다. We'll take the next question.

다음으로 질문해 주실 분은

The following question will be presented by Jamie Ahn from NH Investment & Securities. Please go ahead with your question.

네, 안녕하세요.

NH투자증권의 안재민입니다. 질문 기회 주셔서 감사합니다.

뭐 2분기 실적 좀 요약을 해 주셨던 거 같은데, 좀 하이라이트해 치고 싶은 부분들이 있으면 좀 말씀해 주시면 감사하겠고요. 사실 조금 더 궁금한 부분들은 하반기에 지금 보았던 수익성이 계속 유지될 수 있는지 실적 전망에 대해서 말씀 한번 부탁드리겠습니다.

두 번째는 AI 관련해서 이제 뭐 트래픽이랑 그리고 파트너사와 제휴 성과도 좀 이야기해 주셨는데, 좀 이게 의미 있게 매출에 좀 기여할 수 있는 시점, 그리고 관련해서 중장기 수익화에 대한 이제 회사의 생각도 좀 말씀해 주시면 감사하겠습니다.

Thank you, I am Jamie Ahn from NH Investment & Securities. Thank you for taking my question.

You did give us a summary of your second quarter financial performance. Any aspect of that result that you wish to highlight, if you could provide us with that additional color, that would be helpful.

Do you believe that you will be able to sustain this good performance as you move into the second half of the year? I have a second question, which relates to timing.

When do you believe that these AI partnership endeavors with the partner companies can start to make meaningful contribution to your performance? What are your thoughts on your mid- to longer-term monetization strategy?

예, 그 우선 첫 번째 질문 답변드리겠습니다. 그

2분기에는 플랫폼 부문의 매출이 전년 동기 대비 17% 증가하면서 연결 수익성의 개선을 견인했습니다. 그 카카오페이 역시 증권사 호조를 바탕으로 흑자 전환 이후 5분기 연속 영업이익 최고치를 경신하면서 플랫폼 부문의 성장에 기여했습니다.

특히 이번 실적 발표에서 강조드리고 싶은 부분은 그 카카오의 핵심 사업입니다. 톡비즈는 광고와 커머스의 성장이 재가속되면서 2분기 매출 성장률이 4년 만에 두 자릿수를 회복했습니다.

기존 사업의 호조에 힘입어 카카오 브레인 편입 이후 AI 투자가 이어지고 있는 가운데서도 별도 영업이익률은 전년 동기 대비 1%포인트 상승한 18%로 편입 이후 가장 높은 수준을 기록했습니다. 이제 카카오 별도는 AI 투자를 지속하면서도 본업의 수익성을 함께 높일 수 있는 단계에 들어섰다고 판단합니다.

This is the CFO, responding to your question. In the second quarter, we've seen our platform revenue actually post a 17% year-over-year growth, really driving the overall consolidated profit.

If you look at Kakao Pay as well, supported by strong performance from its brokerage business, it made a turnaround into profit, and it rewrote its historical record in terms of quarterly operating profit and made contribution to our platform business. The aspects that I would like to highlight for this quarter are the core businesses of Kakao.

We've seen re-acceleration of the growth from Talk Biz ad and commerce business, and as a result, if you look at our top-line growth rate in the second quarter, we were able to recover for the first time in 4 years a double-digit growth rate. Supported by the strength from such core businesses, even after the inclusion of Kakao Brain, and even with continuing investment into AI, on a standalone basis, our operating profit margin increased by 1 percentage point year-over-year, reporting 18%, which is the highest level since the inclusion of Kakao Brain.

Which goes to show that even Kakao on a standalone basis can continue on with its AI investment, and at the same time drive profitability of its core businesses. 고마진 핵심 사업의 성장이 외형 확대를 넘어 이익 수준을 끌어올리는 흐름이 한층 뚜렷해진 가운데 지배구조 개편과 사업 구조 단순화 효과가 더해졌습니다.

2분기에는 적자 사업의 손실 부담이 낮아지면서 핵심 플랫폼에서 창출한 이익이 다른 사업의 손실에 희석되지 않고 연결 실적에 본격적으로 반영되기 시작했습니다. 그동안 자본시장에 지속적으로 소통해 온 것처럼 카카오는 선택과 집중이라는 키워드를 중심으로 핵심에 보다 집중한 건강한 성장을 위한 기반을 마련해 왔습니다.

2분기의 실적 호조는 이러한 작업의 결과물이라고 생각합니다.

We now see a clearer pattern where on top of revenue growth from our core businesses, we've also seen momentum behind our bottom-line and profit improvement. On top of that, there was an impact from governance change as well as streamlining of our business structure.

As a result, in the second quarter, we were able to mitigate the impact from loss-making business and also generate profit from our core platform business, whereby the losses no longer actually dilute the consolidated performance of the company. As we've been communicating over the years to the capital market, we've adopted a strategy with the keyword of selective focus.

I believe that this outcome is a result of a very sound and healthy growth endeavors over the years. The good performance that we are seeing in the second half is actually the result of such effort.

네, 이어서 두 번째 질문에 대한 답변드리겠습니다. 그 앞서 언급한

2분기 실적 호조는 그 일시적 고점이라기보다 카카오 이익 체력이 한 단계 올라왔다는 증거이며, 그 향후 실적을 바라보는 새로운 기준점이라고 말씀드릴 수 있습니다.

Now moving on to the second part of your question about the second half of the year outlook, the good performance that we've seen in the second quarter is not a one-time peak. It really goes to show that our earnings capacity has now been notched up one level higher, and it is now forming a new baseline for us in terms of our future performance.

플랫폼 부문은 구조적인 성장 구간에 재진입한 만큼 하반기에도 성장세가 이어지며 영업이익률의 개선을 견인할 것으로 예상됩니다. 또한 연중 추진해 온 다양한 성장 전략의 성과들이 가시화되고 있는 가운데 작년 하반기 기저 부담을 상쇄해 갈 것으로 전망하고 있습니다.

여기에 더해 비핵심 사업 정리 효과 역시

3분기를 기점으로 온전하게 반영되면서 2분기 수준의 높은 수익성이 하반기에도 견조하게 이어질 것으로 보고 있습니다. 이에 연초 설정했던 연결 재무 목표인 연간 매출 10% 이상의 성장과 영업이익률 10% 달성은 무리 없이 초과 달성할 수 있을 것으로 전망합니다.

Our assessment is that the platform business has re-entered the structural growth phase, in the second half of the year, we expect the growth trajectory to continue and drive further improvement in operating profit margin. We are seeing tangible results based upon various different strategies that we've implemented over the year, and we believe that it will offset last year's base effect that weighs down on the performance.

On top of this, starting in the third quarter, we will see the impact of the streamlining of our non-core businesses fully reflected in our numbers in Q3, and so we expect that we will be able to continue on with the relatively higher profitability in the third quarter of the year as we've seen in Q2. Hence, we believe that our consolidated financial target of per annum top-line growth of more than 10% and OP margin of 10%, which are the targets that we set at the beginning of the year, we will be without much difficulty be able to outperform those targets.

카카오 별도의 경우 기존 광고와 커머스 성장이

AI에 대한 투자 부담을 상쇄하기 시작했습니다. 현재 AI는 매출 기여에 앞서 투자가 선행되는 단계입니다.

다만 카카오는 비용 부담을 효율적으로 관리하고 있어 AI 오펙스는 하반기에도 현재 수준에서 유지될 것으로 예상합니다. 기존 사업의 성장은 AI가 매출 기여를 시작하는 시점까지의 투자 부담을 충분히 감내 가능한 수준으로 만들고 있습니다.

On Kakao's standalone basis, the growth that we see from advertisement and commerce business is offsetting our AI investment burden. AI right now is at the investment phase ahead of making contributions to the top line, but we at Kakao are making efficient cost controls and cost management, and so we believe that AI-related operating expense in the second half of the year will be maintained at the current level.

The growth from our existing core legacy businesses are ample enough to support us up until the time that our AI business starts making revenue contribution. 중장기 관점에서

AI는 카카오의 매출 성장세와 영업이익 체력을 현재에서 한 단계 더 끌어올리는 새로운 동력이 될 것으로 전망합니다. 앞서 말씀드린 바와 같이 2028년에는 AI가 창출하는 신규 매출이 전체 톡비즈 매출에서 두 자릿수 비중을 차지할 것으로 전망하고 있습니다.

기존 광고와 커머스의 견조한 성장에 AI의 수익 기여가 더해지면서 카카오 별도 영업이익률 역시 20%를 크게 상회하는 수준으로 개선될 것으로 기대합니다.

From a mid- to longer-term perspective, we project that AI is going to be the new growth engine that actually drives Kakao's top-line growth and also that strengthens our operating profit capacity. As I mentioned before, in 2028, we expect to see that the new revenue that's generated by AI will account for double-digit share out of the entire Talk Biz revenue.

On top of our advertisement and commerce solid growth from these two businesses, on top of which there will be AI contribution, eventually we will be able to see our OP margin significantly outperform the 20% level on a separate basis. 시간 관계상 마지막 질문 받겠습니다.

As we are running out of time, we will be taking the final question. 마지막으로 질문해 주실 분은 HSBC의 김준현 님입니다.

thank you very much for taking my question. I remember that beginning of the year you've guided us that you are looking to grow your Talk Biz ad business by double digit.

I would like to know as to whether that guidance still is valid. If you believe that such growth could actually continue on, not only into the second half, but to next year, if that growth can continue, what will be the key levers that enable that growth?

My second question is, recently within the sector, there's been growing interest on infrastructure business, including AI data centers and GPU cloud. Would like to understand what Kakao's strategy is in regards to this sector.

네, 하반기와 내년 광고 성장 전망과 또 성장 드라이버에 대해서 제가 답변드리겠습니다. 하반기 톡비즈 광고는 비즈니스 메시지와 톡 디스플레이 광고의 견조한 성장, 그리고 커머스 광고의 본격적인 매출 기여를 바탕으로 하여 두 자릿수 성장세를 이어갈 것으로 예상합니다.

특히 피드형 광고의 경우 높은 광고 효율과 신규 광고주 확보 측면에서 경쟁력을 입증하면서 2분기 톡 DA 성장의 대부분을 견인했습니다. 이에 따라 앞으로도 피드형 광고를 중심으로 DA 성장을 지속해 나갈 계획입니다.

This is Shina, I will address your question on the second half and next year advertisement growth outlook. Now, for the second half of the year, we are looking to see business message and Talk display ad to report a robust growth driving the overall Talk Biz ad, and commerce advertisement will be making revenue contribution, we believe that double-digit growth still holds as we go forward.

In particular, if you look at the in-feed ad, it actually has high advertisement efficiency, as well as in terms of onboarding new advertisers, it's been able to prove that it is competitive and had really driven the overall Talk display ad growth in the second quarter. Our plan is to continue to focus on in-feed ad to drive display ad growth.

피드형 광고는 이용자가 콘텐츠를 탐색하는 과정에서 자연스럽게 노출되는 구조인 만큼 기존 광고 상품 대비 주목도와 전환율이 높아 광고 가치가 우수합니다. 이를 바탕으로 2분기에는 비즈보드를 제외한 DA 매출이 전년 동기 대비 3배 증가했고, 전체 DA에서 차지하는 매출 비중 역시 45%까지 확대되었습니다.

이는 비즈보드 중심이던 광고 매출 구조가 피드형 광고를 중심으로 다변화되고 있음을 보여주는 의미 있는 변화라고 판단합니다. Such feed-type advertisement actually naturally surfaces when the user actually explores or searches for content, compared to the more traditional type of ad product, its attention and conversion metrics are quite good.

Supported by these levers, excluding Bizboard, if you look at DA revenue, we've seen an year-over-year growth of 3 times, and out of the total DA business, its revenue mix expanded to 45%. For our advertisement revenue, the pivot is shifting and diversifying further away from Bizboard-centered structure to one that is more focused on feed-type advertisement, and hence we believe this to be quite meaningful.

앞으로도 소식 서비스 고도화와 숏폼 콘텐츠 생태계 확대를 통해 이용자 활동성을 더욱 늘려가는 한편, 광고 상품 경쟁력을 지속적으로 강화하면서 피드형 광고의 성장을 이어가도록 하겠습니다. 이와 함께 중장기적으로는 AI 서비스를 기반으로 새로운 광고 수익 모델을 발굴하고 검색 광고 시장까지 사업 영역을 확대하는 것을 중요한 과제로 보고 있습니다.

Going forward, we will continue to enhance the social feed service and expand the short-form content ecosystem so that we can further drive user activity. We will continuously solidify and strengthen competitiveness of our advertisement product so that we can sustain the growth in feed-based advertisement.

From a more mid- to longer-term horizon, supported by AI services, we will be identifying new advertisement business model, and we also consider expanding into the search ad market as one of our key tasks going forward. 하반기 톡 내

AI 서비스가 유의미한 이용자 기반을 확대하게 되면, AI 탐색 경험을 통해 이용자의 관심사와 구매 의도를 보다 정확하게 이해할 수 있게 되고, 기존 키워드 중심의 검색 광고를 넘어서는 새로운 AI 기반 광고 경험을 제공할 수 있을 것으로 기대하고 있습니다. 현재 국내 디지털 광고 시장은 디스플레이 광고와 검색 광고가 양대 축을 이루고 있지만, 카카오는 지금까지 디스플레이 광고를 중심으로 사업을 전개해 왔습니다.

향후에는 그동안 진출하지 못했던 검색 광고 시장을 바탕으로 사업 영역을 확장하면서 중장기 성장 동력을 마련해 나가겠습니다.

Come the second half of the year, once our AI service within KakaoTalk gains a meaningful amount of user base, we will be able to have a more precise understanding of the interest and the intent of the users via the way of their AI search, and we will be able to provide a more broader experience that is powered by AI that goes beyond the keyword-based search ad realm. If you look at the domestic digital advertisement market, there are two pillars, which are display ad and search ad.

Up to now, Kakao had been doing its business mostly around the display ad business. Going forward, we will enter into also this search ad market, and expand that market so that we can gain a mid- to long-term growth engine.

다음으로

AI 팩토리, B2B 인프라 사업에 대해 답 드리겠습니다. AI 데이터 센터와 GPU 클라우드 시장을 포함해 AI 가치사슬 전반의 사업성은 충분히 검토했습니다.

다만 카카오가 AI 시대에 가장 높은 경쟁력을 만들 수 있는 영역은 인프라 레이어가 아니라고 판단했습니다. 카카오는 그동안 이용자의 일상에 깊이 스며드는 서비스를 만들 수 있는 B2C 역량을 기반으로 성공 방정식을 만들어 왔습니다.

AI 시대에서도 이러한 카카오의 경쟁력은 달라지지 않을 것이라고 봅니다. 이용자가 매일 일상에서 지속적으로 사용하는 AI 서비스를 만들어내는 것이 카카오가 가장 잘할 수 있는 영역이기 때문에 여기에 모든 역량을 집중하는 것이 주주들의 기대에 부합할 수 있는 폭발적인 성장을 만들어낼 가능성이 가장 높다고 판단하고 있습니다.

Next, I would like to talk about our strategy for AI Factory and B2B infrastructure. Now, within the company, we carried out a close review of business feasibility across all of the AI value chain, including AI data centers and GPU cloud, but we feel that the area that we can make the most difference is not the infrastructure layer.

Because Kakao as a company has made formula for success based on B2C capabilities, developing services that can be diffused into every aspect of people's daily lives. In the AI era, this competitiveness will continue.

Because this is what we are best at, I believe and I think that it's the best way for us to meet the shareholder expectations, and this is an area where there is a bit better chance for us to drive explosive growth. 또한 재무적인 측면에서도

AI 인프라 사업은 대규모의 선행 투자와 지속적인 설비 투자가 필요한 사업입니다. 최근 AI 기술의 변화 속도를 보면 GPU와 AI 서버 같은 하드웨어 장비의 세대교체가 매우 빠르게 이루어지고 있습니다.

여기에 경쟁적인 공급 확대가 이어지고 있는 상황까지 감안할 경우 현재 수요와 공급 간의 불균형에서 발생하는 높은 수익성이 장기간 지속될 것이라 담보하기는 어렵습니다. 이에 단기적으로 감내해야 할 재무적인 부담 대비 미래에 기대할 수 있는 ROI가 충분히 높지 않다고 판단하고 있습니다.

From the financial perspective, AI infrastructure business requires large-scale leading investment as well as ongoing capex. Considering the speed of technological change that we see in AI, GPU and AI server and hardware replacement cycle is changing very fast.

There is competitive supply expansion that is taking place, we cannot guarantee high margin or profitability to continue over an extended period of time from the supply imbalance. We believe that prospective ROI may not be sufficiently high compared to the short-term financial burden.

결론적으로 카카오의 핵심 경쟁력과 재무적인 측면 모두를 고려해 보았을 때 케펙스 자체가 경쟁력의 본질이 되는 인프라 레이어에 큰 자본을 배분하면서 본격적으로 진출하기보다는 전 국민이 일상에서 습관적으로 쓰는

AI 서비스를 만들기 위해 모델 레이어부터 서비스 레이어까지 보다 집중하며 기업 가치를 제고해 나가겠습니다.

Considering the core competitive edge that Kakao has and the financial implications, rather than spend huge amount of capital into the infrastructure layer where capex dictates, we will focus on the models layer all the way up to the service layer to develop AI services that can form part of everyone's daily habit in order to drive the corporate value. Thank you.

이상으로

2026년 2분기 실적 발표 컨퍼런스 콜을 마무리하겠습니다. 참여해 주신 여러분 감사합니다.

Thank you. This will end the second quarter 2026 earnings conference call of Kakao.

Thank you for participating.