Seek shares dropped 14 per cent to $13.77 on Wednesday following the release of its FY26 results. The decline extends a fall of around 43 per cent over twelve months, against an ASX 200 that has gained roughly 4 per cent over the same period.

Sales revenue climbed 17 per cent to $1.284 billion and net revenue rose 10 per cent to $1.199 billion. EBITDA increased 15 per cent to $530 million and adjusted profit rose 28 per cent to $199 million.

Yield growth reached 18 per cent across Asia Pacific, a sixth consecutive year of double-digit gains. ANZ revenue grew 12 per cent with paid ad yield up 14 per cent, though ANZ job ad volumes fell 2 per cent year on year as hiring activity weakened through the second half.

Deeper adoption of upgraded advertisement tiers contributed to the yield result, alongside value-based pricing linked to customer return on investment and inflation-linked price changes. Improved ad performance and higher-fit applications also lifted placement predictability.

The statutory result looked considerably worse than the operating numbers. Seek reported a $307 million loss from continuing operations and a $371 million loss across total operations, including a $201 million net loss from the Seek Growth Fund and $377 million of significant items.

Much of that related to a previously announced $356 million impairment charge against the Zhaopin investment. Net debt leverage improved to 1.8 times EBITDA from 2.1 times.

FY27 guidance points to revenue of $1.21 billion to $1.28 billion, EBITDA of $530 million to $580 million, and adjusted net profit of $185 million to $215 million. At the midpoint that implies 5 per cent revenue growth, 6 per cent EBITDA growth and 3 per cent adjusted net profit growth.

A sale process for Seek's stake in Employment Hero is underway, with discussions also covering near-term sales of investments valued at over $1 billion. Bell Potter downgraded the stock to hold and cut its price target to $15.20 from $18.58, while the final dividend of 25 cents took the FY26 payout to a record 52 cents.