FAQ

When was the company founded?
The company was founded in 1997. For more details on the history of the company, please refer to this page.
Why is the company called Yandex?
It is an abbreviation of “yet another indexer”, an original name of a new version of a search program, launched by the founders, Ilya Segalovich and Arkady Volozh.
For more details on the history of the company, please refer to this page.
Where can I get the company’s historical information?
The history of the company is presented here.
What is the company’s geographical presence?
Yandex currently operates in 15 countries and has offices and representations in 10 countries.
For more details on the geographical presence, please refer to this page.
What is Yandex’ total headcount?
20,850 as of December 31, 2022.

What are our businesses?
Yandex is a technology company that builds intelligent products and services powered by machine learning. Our goal is to help consumers and businesses better navigate the online and offline world. Since 1997, we have delivered world-class, locally relevant search and information services. Additionally, we have developed market-leading on-demand transportation services, navigation products and other mobile applications for millions of consumers across the globe.
We derive a substantial part of our revenues from online advertising. We enable advertisers to deliver targeted, cost effective ads on our own search results and other Yandex webpages, as well as on thousands of third-party websites. A few years ago, we embarked on a strategy to diversify our revenue streams and broaden the appeal of our ecosystem. Other revenue streams are growing rapidly and come from our E-commerce, Mobility and Delivery businesses; our Plus and Entertainment Services, and Classifieds businesses, as well as Other Business Units and Initiatives, including Cloud, Devices and other businesses.
For more details on the business structure of the company, please refer to this page.
What is Yandex Plus?
Yandex Plus is a subscription service to Yandex products launched in May 2018 and subsequently upgraded in August 2020 (an access to the full KinoPoisk HD catalog was added to previously available Yandex Music and individual bonus programs and discounts for Yandex Plus members were replaced with a unified cashback offering). For more Yandex Plus’ benefits please check plus.yandex.ru.
Who are Yandex’s key competitors?
We operate in a market characterized by rapid commercial and technological change, and we face significant competition in many aspects of our business, including search and digital advertising, ride-hailing, e-commerce, food and grocery delivery, classifieds, media services, cloud and others. For more information regarding our competitors please check the section "Competition" of Item 4 of our Annual Reports on Form 20-F filed with the SEC.
Key business abbreviations: CPC, CPA, ROI, CPM, CTR, CR, DAU, MAU
- CPC (Cost Per Click) is a cost per one click to an ad
- CPA (Cost Per Action) is an online advertising measurement and pricing model, referring to a specified action (e.g. a sale, click, form submission, download, etc.)
- ROI / ROMI (Return on Investment/Return on Marketing Investment) is a metric used in online marketing to measure the effectiveness of a marketing campaign (for example how much revenue a marketing campaign is generating compared to the cost of running that campaign)
- CPM (Cost Per Mille) is a cost per thousand of ad impressions
- CTR (Click-Through Rate) is a ratio of clicks to ad impressions, which can be used to evaluate efficiency of an ad, its appeal to audience and targeting efficiency
- CR (Conversion Rate) is a ratio of users that completed a desired action (a registration, a purchase or something else) relative to the number of users that clicked to an ad and visited an advertiser’s website
- DAU (Daily Active Users) is a number of unique users who visit a site or mobile app in a given day
- MAU (Monthly Active Users) is a number of unique users who visited a site or mobile app during the last month

What is the fiscal year-end?
Yandex’s fiscal year-end is December 31st of every calendar year.
Does Yandex issue quarterly reports?
Yes, quarter reports are usually published in the end of April (Q1), July (Q2) and October (Q3). Fourth quarter and full year results are usually released in mid-February.
Where can I get the company’s historical financial information?
Yandex’s historical financial information can be found in the regularly updated Data Book,
in the “Financials” section and in our Annual Reports on Form 20-F filed with the SEC.
Who is Yandex’s auditor?
Yandex’s auditor is JSC PwC.
What is Yandex’ segment reporting?
As of Q4 2022, Yandex’s segment reporting includes Search and Portal, E-Commerce, Mobility and Delivery, Plus and Entertainment Services, Classifieds and Other Business Units and Initiatives.
The E-commerce, Mobility and Delivery segment includes our transactional online-to-offline (O2O) businesses, which consist of (i) the mobility businesses, including ride-hailing in Russia and other countries across CIS and EMEA, Yandex Drive, our car-sharing business for both B2C and B2B and scooters; (ii) the E-commerce businesses in Russia and CIS, including Yandex Market, our multi-category e-commerce marketplace, Yandex Lavka Russia, our hyperlocal convenience store delivery service, and the grocery delivery services of Yandex Eats and Delivery Club (since September 8, 2022, when the deal was completed); and (iii) our other O2O businesses, including Yandex Delivery, our last-mile logistics solution for individuals, enterprises and SMB (small and medium business); Yandex Eats and Delivery Club Food Delivery, our ready-toeat delivery services from restaurants; Lavka Israel, our hyperlocal convenience store delivery service; Yandex Fuel, our contactless payment service at gas stations, and several smaller experiments.
The Other Business Units and Initiatives category includes our self-driving vehicles business (Yandex SDG), Zen (up to September 12, 2022 when the deconsolidation transaction was completed), Yandex Cloud, Yandex Education, Devices, FinTech, Toloka, RouteQ and number of other experiments as well as unallocated corporate expenses.
Does Yandex consolidate all of its businesses?
Yes, Yandex consolidates all of its businesses. Yandex also operates MLU B.V. as a joint venture with Uber. MLU B.V. (Taxi) includes Mobility services (ride-hailing and car-sharing) where Yandex owns 71% and Uber owns 29%.
What is Yandex’s international exposure?
On a geographical basis, based on the billing address of the customer, we generated more than 92% of our total revenues in each of 2019, 2020 and 2021 from customers in Russia. The businesses with international presence mainly include ride-hailing and advertising (Search and Portal).
What is Yandex’s FX exposure?
The revenues and expenses of our Russian operating subsidiaries are primarily denominated in Russian ruble, and overall Yandex has very limited direct FX exposure in its operations.
Only a marginal part of the company’s operating costs is exposed to FX, which primarily relate to the certain content acquisition costs and part of the production costs for our Devices business.
Previously the lease payments for the rented office space located in our headquarters complex in Moscow were denominated in U.S. dollars. In February 2021, the company negotiated prolongation of lease agreements for this office space to extend lease terms until July 2024 and to change currency of lease payments from U.S. dollars to Russian rubles.
Our largest FX exposure is infrastructure capital expenditure (servers, networking and engineering equipment). Infrastructure capex accounted for about half of our total capital expenditures in 2021.
What is Yandex’s capex structure?
Data centers, including servers, networking equipment and engineering, account for about half of Yandex’s capital expenditures. The remaining part is spent on office infrastructure, projects (including Yandex Market and Yandex Lavka) as well as investments in the construction of the company’s new Campus.
Key financial abbreviations: TAC, Ex-TAC, SBC
- TAC (Traffic Acquisition Costs) relates to Partner TAC and Distribution TAC.
  Partner TAC is the part of advertising revenue we share with partners in the Yandex Ad Network for serving ads on their websites.
  Distribution TAC is a payment to our partners who distribute our products or otherwise direct search queries to our websites.
- Ex-TAC revenue is a non-GAAP metric, which represents revenues excluding the part, shared with the company’s partners in form of Traffic Acquisition Costs. We are constantly looking to add new value-accretive Ad Network and Distribution partners, enhance our existing partnerships and optimize revenue sharing terms to better align it with the quality of traffic that our partnerships generate. Even though we can boost our top-line revenue growth by taking on as many partnerships as possible at non-attractive revenue sharing terms to us, it might actually lead to lower ex-TAC revenue and profitability. Therefore, we focus on ex-TAC online advertising revenue growth, which is one of the main KPIs for the advertising team.
- SBC (Share‑Based Compensation) is a portion of total compensation of Yandex employees in the form of granted equity-based awards.

When the company went public and where its shares traded?
In May 2011 Yandex went public on the NASDAQ stock exchange, under the ticker YNDX, and subsequently listed on Moscow Exchange (MOEX) in June 2014.
Since February 28, 2022, NASDAQ has halted the trading in Yandex’ Class A shares as well as securities of a number of companies with material operations in Russia.
As a result of significant market volatility, on February 28, 2022, Moscow Exchange suspended the trading in securities, including Yandex’ Class A shares. Since March, 24, MOEX began gradual resumption of trading, including Yandex’s shares on March 29, 2022.
What is your capital structure, do you have different share classes?
Yandex’s capital structure consists of Class A shares, Class B shares, Class C shares and one Priority Share, held by a Public Interest Foundation. No other priority shares have been issued.
The principal features of the three classes of ordinary shares and the Priority Share are as follows:
- Class A shares, par value €0.01 per share, entitled to one vote per share. The Class A shares share ratably with the Class B shares, on a pari passu basis, in any dividends or other distributions.
- Class B shares, par value €0.10 per share, entitled to ten votes per share. Class B shares may only be transferred to qualified holders. In order to sell a Class B share, it must be converted into a Class A share.
- Class C shares, par value €0.09 per share, entitled to nine votes per share. The Class C shares are used for technical purposes related to the conversion of Class B shares into Class A shares. During the periods between conversion and cancellation, all Class C shares are held by the Yandex Conversion Foundation.
- The Priority Share gives the holder (other than the Company) the right to veto the accumulation of stakes in the Company in excess of 10% by a single entity, a group of related parties or parties acting in concert, as well as the right to make binding nominations of two of the 12 members of the Company’s Board of Directors. Transfer of the Priority Share requires the approval of the Board.
What is Yandex’s shareholder structure?
Yandex’s shareholder structure is presented here.
Does Yandex pay dividends?
No, Yandex doesn’t pay dividends.
How can I contact the investor relations team?
You can contact the IR service of Yandex by submitting a question via a form or by an e-mail to askIR@yandex-team.ru.