Asian Tech Press (Mar. 31) -- TikTok's advertising revenue has grown at a compound annual growth rate (CAGR) of 300% in 2021, people familiar with the matter said Wednesday.

The sources disclosed that, at the same time, its parent company ByteDance's advertising revenue in China has slowed down, but TikTok's e-commerce business has maintained continuous growth.

As previously reported, ByteDance posted double-digit growth by achieving ad revenue of about 115 billion yuan ($18.13 billion) in the first half of 2021.

However, in the second half of the year, TikTok owner's advertising revenue in China grew at a near-zero quarter-to-quarter rate in certain months, the first time in its nine years of establishment.

The people also said that ByteDance saw full-year revenue in 2021, mainly due to the rapid increase in its Chinese e-commerce business and overseas TikTok.

Rumors spread on Wednesday that a Reuters report exposed ByteDance's full-year 2021 revenue totaled about 369.2 billion yuan ($58 billion), up 70% YoY, with ad revenue accounting for 77%, reaching nearly 280 billion yuan, surpassing China's total ad revenue of 194.006 billion yuan from the radio and television broadcasting industry in 2020.

ByteDance then issued a disinformation that night, saying that after the company's checking, it was a rumor that its ad revenue in 2021 exceeded the total revenue of national TV stations, and that Reuters had never released the news that ByteDance's ad revenue exceeded 280 billion yuan.

(US$1 = 6.3433 yuan)