Bring on the hard-cores!

That’s the battle cry these days at Middle Eastern social networking and gaming company Yalla Group Ltd. (YALA.US), which is betting big on a pivot to hardcore games as it seeks to bring back investors who flocked to the company in its earlier days of strong double- and even triple-digit growth. The company, which has experimented with a metaverse game as well, also hinted at another upcoming initiative aimed at animation lovers with the release of its latest quarterly results released on Monday.

Yalla played up those initiatives as it reported stable revenue growth in the second quarter, continuing a trend for most of the past year. Despite that, it posted strong profit gains for the period, though much of that was due to factors beyond its control as its big cash holdings allowed it to profit from the current high interest rate environment.