HONG KONG, March 19 (Reuters) - China's Tencent Music

Entertainment Group ( TME ) beat fourth-quarter revenue estimates on

Tuesday, driven by growth in paid subscription on its

Spotify ( SPOT )-like music streaming platform.

The audio entertainment platform reported revenue of 6.89

billion yuan ($957.06 million) for the quarter, marking a 7.2%

decline as compared to the same period last year. Analysts on

average had expected revenue of 6.71 billion yuan, according to

LSEG data.

The number of paying users rose to 106.7 million, marking a

21% jump for the quarter as compared to the same period last

year.

In an earnings call on Tuesday, Cussion Pang, the company's

executive chairman, attributed the growth in subscribers to "the

efficient execution of Tencent Music's content and platform dual

engine strategy and the counter-cyclical feature of the music

industry."

But the online music service still suffered a year-on-year

revenue decline, which is a partly result of China's regulatory

crackdown on music platforms' chance-based features last year.

Charlie Chai, a Shanghai-based analyst at 86Research, said,

"The social entertainment segment is still feeling the pains

from the recent regulatory crackdown. The gambling-related

revenue took a much higher-than-expected percentage of Tencent

Music's revenue, and this part is now disappearing."

U.S.- listed shares of Tencent Music rose 2% in morning

trading in New York.

The company's online music service revenue jumped 41.1% to

5.02 billion yuan year-on-year, thanks to steady growth in paid

subscriptions and advertising services.

Tencent Music's earnings per American depository share

(ADS)stood at 0.83 yuan, compared to 0.72 yuan in the same

period a year earlier.

($1 = 7.1991 Chinese yuan renminbi)