MercadoLibre Q1 2024 Earnings Call Transcript

Quartr
Provided by Quartr
May 2, 2024

There are 18 speakers on the call.

Operator

Hello, everyone, and welcome to the MercadoLibre Earnings Conference Call for

Speaker 1

the quarter ended March 31, 2024. Thank you for joining us. I'm Richard Cathcart, MercadoLibre's Investor Relations Officer. Today, we will share our quarterly highlights on video, after which we will begin our live Q and A session with our management team. Before we go on to discuss our results for the Q1 of 2024, I remind you that management may make or refer to, and this presentation may contain forward looking statements and non GAAP measures.

Speaker 1

So please refer to the disclaimer on screen, which will also be available in our earnings materials on our Relations website. With that, let's begin with a summary of our results.

Speaker 2

Hello, everyone. I'm pleased to report another quarter of solid results with excellent operational and financial performance in Brazil and Mexico. Both countries posted GMV growth of approximately 30% year on year as we carry over strong momentum from Q4. This above market growth is being driven by several factors including improvement of user experience with many mice as the highlight, our strategic investment in cheap infrastructure which are driving faster growth in specific target regions, and a well executed marketing campaign that is leveraging on the awareness we generated in Q4 around peak season. In addition, our advertising business continues to grow nicely and reach record levels of GMV penetration in all of the markets where we operate.

Speaker 2

Mercado Pago also had a solid performance in Mexico and Brazil, with some of the highlights being the acquiring business growing at accelerated rate sequentially in both countries. We had a solid credit growth portfolio surpassing the $4,400,000,000 and growing strongly from last year and a strong quarter for Mercado Cargo Credit Card. We issued 1,500,000 cards during this quarter and the TPV reached $1,900,000,000 growing 173% from last year. In summary, in Q1, we delivered a strong operational performance in commerce and fintech, both in Brazil and Mexico, which has offset the negative impact of a weak macro in Argentina and the peso devaluation in that country. Before turning to our financial performance in more detail, I'd like to highlight that there are a couple of reporting updates that have taken effect in this quarter.

Speaker 2

Investors can find a summary of the impacts on our financials in this quarter's shareholders letter and a full reconciliation in our earnings presentation. My comments today will refer to the numbers that are comparable to the figures we reported in Q1 last year. Consolidated revenues grew at a fast pace on the back of the strong operational momentum that I mentioned earlier. Brazil and Mexico had an outstanding quarter and the revenues growth was sufficient to offset the impact of headwinds in Argentina. Income from operations grew strongly year on year once again with margin expansion being driven by Mexico and Brazil.

Speaker 2

This reflects the combination of growth, scale and cost efficiency that drives operational leverage. And our long term ambition is to continue delivering both growth and profit and we are confident in our ability to achieve that. Net income grew at a faster pace than income from operation as lower FX losses in Argentina were partially offset at lower operational income in that country. Furthermore, the reporting updates I mentioned earlier have a broadly neutral impact on net income. Overall, we are very pleased with the performance of the business in Q1, despite the headwind from Argentina.

Speaker 2

And this is a great way to kick off Margao Libre's 25th anniversary. Now I'll pass over to Richard for more on the solid foundations we have built for the past 25 years, looking ahead for the next 25 years of Mercado Libre.

Speaker 1

In 2024, MercadoLibre will celebrate its 25th anniversary, and we look back on the progress we've made in democratizing commerce and financial services in Latin America. Today, MELI is the leading technology company in the region and a major tech company globally and has been recognized for its innovation, growth, and impact in the region. In addition to business growth and impact, MercadoLibre has a consistent track record of generating shareholder value since our IPO in 2,007. We look forward to the next 25 years with great confidence and optimism as we still see plenty of opportunities to continue to grow and fulfill our mission in a region that provides us with a large addressable market. In Latin America, e commerce is far from mature and financial services are ripe for disruption.

Speaker 1

We are the leading e commerce platform in the region, which has significant potential for growth from new buyer and higher frequency as engagement and penetration of retail rise. By building the fastest and most By building the fastest and most

Speaker 3

extensive delivery network in the region and by

Speaker 1

offering the widest assortment and the best UX, we have become a natural destination for buyers and sellers. This drives a uniquely powerful and self reinforcing network effect as sellers invest to maximize their sales by capitalizing on our traffic, whilst buyers receive an which leverages our extensive first party data to offer advertisers unique audience targeting capabilities and complete full funnel strategies. We are challenging the status quo in financial services. And by offering a wide array of easy to use services for individuals and merchants In large markets underserved by incumbents, we have become one of the region's leading fintechs. Our ecosystem is our competitive advantage in fintech services.

Speaker 1

Its data is uniquely rich and enables us to cross sell. It's also enabled us to have a better view of credit risk and operate a business which matches the lowest cost to serve in the region. We have built a highly profitable acquiring business on the back of the market share gains across the region. We are also building MeleMytes with the ambition of being the largest and most valued loyalty program in the by leveraging our ecosystem to offer unique benefits. Technology is at the heart of everything we do, and having one of the largest teams of engineers in the region ensures nonstop innovation and product development.

Speaker 1

We have a diversified mix of revenue with ample opportunities for growth and monetization. Our scale, financial discipline, and tech first mentality mean we have low cost structures with solid and sustainable profitability. MercadoLibre's powerful intrinsic impact on the people we serve encourages entrepreneurship and promotes financial inclusion. We are proud of the achievements of the last 25 years, but our mission is far from complete. As a leader in an e commerce market that is far from mature and one of the leaders in a financial services market that is ripe for disruption, we are confident and optimistic in our future growth.

Speaker 1

As we look forward to the next 25 years, we're confident that the best is yet to come.

Speaker 4

Joining us for the Q and A are Martin De Los Santos, CFO Oswaldo Jimenez, FinTech President and Ariel Sharfstein, Commerce President. Please wait while we compile our Q and A roster. Our first question comes from Andrew Rubin with Morgan Stanley. Your line is open.

Speaker 5

Thanks very much for the question and congratulations on the 25 years. It's helpful the table you provide in the release that breaks down the peso denominated and non peso EBIT. Just thinking about the Argentina business, the unit's down 5%. It didn't strike us as a major decline, but you had a big hit on EBIT. So I was hoping if you could walk us through the situation during the quarter where you had mismatch between revenue and costs.

Speaker 5

And perhaps if you could even how the business evolved on a month over month basis within given how fast moving the Argentina macro situation has been? Thank you.

Speaker 3

Hi, Andrew. How are you? Thank you for your question. This is Martin. Yes, as you know, we in Argentina, we face 2 things happening.

Speaker 3

The devaluation of Argentina, which reduced the size of our business. And as you know, Argentina is a high margin, EBIT margin business operation. And then we have the macro situation that obviously put some pressure in terms of consumption. We've seen reduced volume and demand, even though as you know, we manage marketplace, which is very resilient to this type of situation. So we think we outperformed the consumption in general in the country, but we did suffer some loss of volume in Argentina in the commerce side of the business.

Speaker 3

In terms of cost mismatch, I think we saw some inflation in terms of our shipping costs in Argentina. There was some pressure in that line of our P and L. And then to wrap up the situation in the country, on the FinTech side, the business performed extremely well. We continue to have a very strong brand in Argentina, asset management growing 64% year on year. We doubled the number of users of our investment products, the acquiring business in Argentina growing 300% more than inflation and then active users also growing at 31% year on year.

Speaker 3

So overall, I think that's what you can you see in terms of operating income. But then when you go below operating income and as the double effect, exchange rate situation in Argentina has been normalizing, we see significantly lower FX losses in Argentina. So that's compensated in the net income line of the P and L. So overall, I would say that Argentina was a headwind in terms of EBIT, partially compensated at the net income level because of the lower FX and lower taxes that we paid this quarter in Argentina. But obviously, we had a extraordinary quarter in Brazil and Mexico that I'm sure we'll go in more detail later on in the call.

Speaker 3

Great. Thanks, Martin.

Speaker 4

One moment for our next question. Our next question comes from Bob Ford with Bank of America.

Speaker 6

Thank you very much. Happy anniversary and congratulations on a great quarter. Can you quantify the impact from the shift of Easter on the marketplace as well as Pago in Brazil, Mexico? And then in Argentina, what percent of GMV is done by sellers with less than 10,000 per month? And how much would that would the proposed tax cuts represent to those smaller sellers in terms of GMV?

Speaker 6

And what you need before you're willing to turn the key on interoperability in Argentina in terms of economics, security or any other issues? Thank you.

Speaker 3

Hi Bob, it's Martin here. Let me take the first part. I think you were asking about the effect of Easter on our volume that as you know, we always see reduced volume on those days because typically in our countries 4 consecutive holiday days. And in this quarter, in particular, it was a little stronger because last year, Eastern fell on Q2 and this year fell in Q1. So if you look at the numbers for March, they were affected by those 4 days.

Speaker 3

So there was a little bit of loss of volume, which will eventually reverse next quarter because the opposite happens and will play in favor of April probably. So that's in terms of the 5%,

Speaker 7

is that fair given the

Speaker 8

is that the way we

Speaker 3

should think about it? Well, we don't disclose the month by month numbers, but I'd say in March, we probably lost 5 or 6 percentage points in that particular month. We'll see what happens in April when we announce Q2.

Speaker 8

Bob, let me answer the part of the interoperability question in Argentina. So as you know, we built a QR code network that is extremely successful in Argentina. And a few years back, we were required to interoperate in account to account transactions, which we have been doing for a few years, 2 or 3 years now. That is working very well. And now there's a mandate that we need to also interoperate for credit card transactions, which are a minor part of QR transactions in Argentina, but the majority are account to account.

Speaker 8

So this is a minor part of that volume is credit card transactions. And the way we build the network since there was not a when we built it few years back, there was not a standard for Carcao transactions. We do those transactions in a way which are processed as online payment transactions. And so to be able to interoperate, we need 2 things. On the one hand, there's a technical requirement that those transactions need to be tokenized for the network to be secure.

Speaker 8

And on the other hand is we need to agree on commercial terms with the counterparties, which are likely to be will be banks and other wallet. We are in that process. We have already on our side, we are able to process organized transactions, but we have not yet received those. Meanwhile, we are negotiating with banks about if there will be some sort of interchange or fee for the wallets involved in these interoperable transactions.

Speaker 3

Bob, I think to answer your last question regarding Argentina, obviously, we are observing and analyzing the reform that's going on right now to see what the impact would be on our merchants. And then the number of merchants, I think you are referring to smaller merchants, it's a number that we don't disclose specifically. Thanks.

Speaker 6

Thank you. And again, congratulations.

Speaker 4

Our next question comes from Marcelo Santos with JPMorgan.

Speaker 9

Hi, good evening. Thanks for taking my question. I wanted to ask you about the profitability of Argentina. There was a very steep decline in the EBIT contribution of Argentina versus what you reported last year. I just wanted to understand, is this kind of a new ongoing level, a new level for Argentina given this new currency reality?

Speaker 9

Or was there something more like one off in this quarter that could be reversed in next couple of quarters? Just because today Argentina as the way you disclosed almost the same profitability as the rest, why it used to be much more profitable. So just wanted to understand that. Thank you.

Speaker 3

Martin here, Marcelo. Thank you for your question. I think we mentioned before, yes, Argentina had some tough macro situation that the evaluation also didn't help because when you look at the revenue growth of Argentina because of the evaluation by definition is ranked relative to the other countries, also has some tough macro and demand issues that affected in particular the commerce side of the business. But then also Brazil and Mexico grew extraordinarily high rate. Just to put it in perspective, the EBIT of Argentina decreased year on year, as you mentioned, but the EBIT outside of Argentina grew by 185 percentage points.

Speaker 3

So almost double the EBIT coming from other countries. So as a result of that, as you can see the current the share of EBIT coming from Argentina now is at 19% compared to a year ago that was about 60%. So I think Argentina, again, the devaluation is behind us. We see macro affecting Q1, and we'll have to see how the rest of the year plays out. But again, we think that in terms of the EBIT contribution is a little bit normalized for the other reasons that I mentioned earlier today that as we have the exchange rate higher than it used to be with the valuation is more normalized because it's lower FX losses.

Speaker 3

So at net income level, the variance is also high, okay? So I will focus a lot more on net income as a main metric to evaluate the results of Mercaldivre. As we have been saying in the past, we were mentioning that there was a little bit of a distortion and the EBIT because of FX in Argentina now is behind. So I think in terms of the FX distortion, I could say that it's something that is a new normal. And now we have numbers that are more normalized in terms of EBIT results.

Speaker 9

Perfect. Thank you very much.

Speaker 4

One moment for our next question. And our next question comes from Irma Segarz with Goldman Sachs.

Speaker 10

Yes. Thanks for the opportunity. I'd like to ask about MELI MISE and Logistics. Thank you for the useful commentary in the shareholder letter. Now as you get further into the rollout of the Meli Mize program, where are you in terms of logistics efficiency gains from the uplift to overall volume and units per shipment?

Speaker 10

And are the costs from greater free shipping subsidies that you provide there now more than offset by those efficiencies? Or will that take more time as you adjust the flow of the network and the overall engagement still rises? And I'd also be curious if there's any notable differences in take up and engagement with that program between Brazil and Mexico. Thank you.

Speaker 3

Hi, Irma. Martin here. Yes, we have seen very good adoption of Melemies and both in terms of adopting the Melemize delivery date for those members that those users are enrolled into the Melemize program. But also we have seen incremental engagement and volume on our platform. So the results that we were expecting in terms of growth driven by many mice, we are seeing them there, and we are super excited with those results.

Speaker 3

Obviously, that increases a little bit the cost of our shipping operations. We estimate that year on year, and so I have the number here to share with you. It does put some pressure on margin. I think it adds 20 basis points as a percentage of GMV of costs. Is more than compensated value that incremental value that we're generating through Melymize.

Speaker 3

And then in terms of your first part of the question, optimizations, we think we are still at very early stages of optimizing Melemies. Remember Melemies comes with a Melemies delivery date, which is a date on the week that the user chooses to get their products. So as we continue to scale the Melimized, we will be able to lower cost of shipping by optimizing the way we group certain products and the way we optimize the delivery cost of getting the products to our users. So it's early stages, but very optimistic and very encouraged by the results of engagements and adoption so far.

Speaker 10

Yes, that's very exciting. And may I just ask about also the reacceleration in TPV growth in Brazil. You highlighted new devices and we know that you've been shifting up market, but I was hoping to just get a bit more detail on the drivers of this acceleration and the direction of the incremental margin that comes attached with the revenues on this? Thanks.

Speaker 8

Hi, Emma. So there were 2 components to the acceleration of TPV in Brazil. I would say the most relevant one is online payments. We have been able to I think there are several quarters in a row now where we have been able to accelerate the growth of online payments in Brazil, mostly by adding several larger merchants, big merchants and increasing the share of wallet we do with them. There are several drivers for this, but definitely better performance and better approval rate.

Speaker 8

We are very encouraged by how we see this acceleration continuing. And then on the point of sale business, as we mentioned in prior calls, we have been changing our go to market strategy, and that is having a good effect. And we are seeing that business growing at an accelerated rate on a quarter on quarter basis. So both mostly online payments, but also to some degree, the point of sale business are accelerating in Brazil.

Speaker 3

As I said to complement that, Irma, in terms of monetization, as we disclosed on the investment presentation, you can see that we continue to increase the cross selling of credit to our acquiring users. So that continues to improve the profitability of that business.

Speaker 10

Very helpful. Thank

Speaker 4

Our next question comes from Jeffrey Elliott with Autonomous.

Speaker 11

Hello. Thanks very much for taking the question. The change in Mercado Envios from agent to principal. The accounting impacts of that are all very clear, so thank you for that. But from a business point of view, what was the objective there?

Speaker 11

What does this mean in practice for the what does it mean in practice on the business side? And why are you doing it? Why have you made this change in terms of conditions?

Speaker 12

Hey, Jeffrey. This is Ariel here. So we see the process on the opposite. So over the last 4 or 5 years, we've been switching from operating purely with national post offices and carriers across Latin America into building our own logistics network. And basically, that process has already occurred.

Speaker 12

So what we've done now is adjusted our terms and conditions bearing ourselves the responsibility for the execution, which is something we've been already doing. So there's nothing new in terms of the way we operate. I think that process has occurred already and we are just now adjusting contractually and formally the way we've been operating for quite some time. Okay.

Speaker 11

So it reflects kind of you taking the risk rather than a National Postal Service taking the risk?

Speaker 3

Say that again?

Speaker 11

So essentially, you're taking the risk on the shipping rather than the national postal service in the different countries and that's why you've made this change?

Speaker 12

You already had the risk. So this is what we've been doing since we launched our own last mile operation in 2019 since which have been taking over warehouses operations, our line calls, etcetera, etcetera. So nothing new, no risk profile changes. Right now, it's just formalizing something that has been happening already.

Speaker 3

I would say that there's no change operationally. There's no incremental risk. It's just an accounting adjustment that we make and it reflects better the way the business is run.

Speaker 11

Got it. Thank you.

Speaker 4

One moment for our next question. Our next question comes from Neha Agarwal with HSBC.

Speaker 13

Hi, congratulations. Thank you for taking my question. Just quickly on the credit business, we saw a continued decline in the 90 day NPL, but there was an increase in the early delinquency, which you mentioned is partly because of shift in the mix of the risk cohorts. Could you please elaborate on that as to why the A delinquencies have increased and what do you mean by shift to riskier cohorts? Thank you so much.

Speaker 8

So there were 2 components to the increase in other delinquencies. On the one hand, as you mentioned, we have been taking more risk going to riskier segments. And the reason we are doing that is because our models are better at forecasting risk and correctly evaluating the risk of each user. And therefore, we are also pricing this accordingly. So even though there are higher NPLs, these credits have been priced with an adequate spread.

Speaker 8

So there's not a sort of concern there. And the other factor that happened was the last week of March, the last week of the quarter ended with 4 days that were either weekend or holidays. And therefore, collections were typically lower than typical because it's on the last 4 days of the month. There was an invoice that have been due in those days that was passed over to the following month. And there was so a small effect for the fact that Good Friday and Good Thursday were the last two non working days of the month.

Speaker 13

If I can ask another question, when I look at your average interest rate, and this is excluding the increase in the provisions, there has been a drop of about 800 basis points quarter on quarter on the average interest rate for your loan book. I understand part of that is probably driven by the expansion in the credit card portfolio. And given the fact that you're moving into riskier cohorts, which are priced accordingly, why such a sharp decline quarter on quarter? Thank

Speaker 3

you. Hi, Ignatavo, it's Martin here. I think, well, firstly, when we compare year on year, the NIMAL margins, I think, is what you're referring to is improving despite the fact that we have a larger share of credit cards, which as you know is lower NIMAL product. On a sequential basis, typically Q1 actually let's put it that way, Q4 tends to be a good quarter for credits because of a strong collection, because of a 13 month on the quarter on the year. So Q4 is a good month for collection.

Speaker 3

Q3 is seasonally lower month for collection. So that's normal. It's something that is expected. In addition to 2 other things happening. Speed in terms of growth of our credit card portfolio is also contributing to that.

Speaker 3

And also the fact that we accelerated originations of other products and that generates more provisions upfront. Remember, we provision 100 percent of the losses upfront when we originate. So we have a queue like Q1 where we accelerated sequentially the originations that tends to put pressure on margin. But like Osvaldo mentioned, there's nothing to worry about. We continue to have very strong EBIT margins at NIMAL margins at 31.5 percentage points.

Speaker 3

So it's something that's out of control and as expected.

Speaker 13

Yes, outlook on the credit business changed or modified slightly in the last month, given that we are now looking at probably a higher for longer kind of rate scenario in both Brazil and Mexico?

Speaker 3

Sorry, Neha, could you repeat the question, please?

Speaker 13

With your outlook in terms of picking up in originations in Wood Brazil and Mexico, has that changed over the last month, given that we are probably now looking for a higher for longer rate scenario in both countries?

Speaker 3

No, it hasn't. We continue to have the same strategy as we had in the past, which is to continue to cautiously increase our credit book as we feel more confident in terms of our underwriting capabilities, as Oswaldo mentioned. And then also we are focusing a lot on growing our credit card, which is a critical product for our FinTech strategy because it has all many benefits. In addition to the credit card, users that pick on start using the credit card use most of our other Fintech products, bring their salaries into our account. They might take a loan.

Speaker 3

They might get an insurance, start using the debit card and so on. So this is an important part of our strategy.

Speaker 8

And with regards to interest rates being a little higher, expectation of them to be higher, that is relatively very small factor when compared to the spreads we have.

Speaker 3

Just to complement that, the fact that our loans are typically short maturity allow us to adjust very rapidly to changing interest environment.

Speaker 13

Perfect. Thank you so much. Very helpful.

Speaker 4

One moment for our next question. Our next question comes from Maria Clara Infantosi with Itau BBA.

Speaker 14

Hi, good evening. Thanks for taking my question. I wanted to explore the potential of monetization of logistics services ahead, given that you showed consistent improvement in the average speed of delivery and also accelerated fulfillment penetration for another quarter. So does the company intend to start being more vocal on charging for the fulfillment services? How far are we from such a scenario?

Speaker 14

Thank you.

Speaker 12

Hi, Maria Clara. Ariel here. Thanks for your question. I think there's no change in strategy for us. As we've been saying over the last few quarters, we know that there's an opportunity in the long run to increase our monetization on our shipping infrastructure.

Speaker 12

For now, we remain focused on: a) capturing most the most out of the efficiencies potential that we have, which means continue driving productivity gains and reducing cost. B, I would say, getting sellers to operate with our network, particularly continue improving our fulfillment penetration, which has been going up consistently. And 3, being disciplined regarding passing through inflation increases. But we know we have another lever for the longer term as to continue monetizing. We just

Speaker 4

Our next question comes from Marvin Fong with BTIG.

Speaker 7

Good evening. Thanks for taking my questions and congratulations on 25 years. So a couple of questions. I'd like to get a little more detail on origination. So I believe it was about the same growth rate as last quarter in dollar terms.

Speaker 7

But just curious if how much Argentina is factored into that. So perhaps you could give us some detail by country like how originations performed, did it accelerate versus last quarter? And then second question, just on Meli delivery days, I believe you gave us some disclosure about how many of your shipments are generated by that channel. Just curious if you could give us an idea, is that a significant money saver for you guys? Or is it really just designed to kind of lower stress on the network, but it's not particularly saving on the cost.

Speaker 7

And additionally, just maybe some idea of where that percentage can go over time? Thanks.

Speaker 8

Hi, Marvin. In terms of origination, most of the acceleration is coming from Brazil, where we are very comfortable with how our models are performing and we see increased demand for our loans. In Argentina, we continue to be cautious. We have accelerated versus last quarter. We have grown versus last quarter, but we are at a rate which is significantly lower in dollar terms, significantly lower than what it was prior to the elections.

Speaker 8

And in Mexico, we are growing on a year on year basis, but the origination was similar to that of prior quarter.

Speaker 3

And I would add to that, we had a devaluation in the middle, so that also affects the growth rates in Argentina when you compare year on year basis. But we continue to have a very healthy book in Argentina. It's probably the lowest NPLs or other regions, but we are cautious as well to mention.

Speaker 12

Hey Marvin, Ariel here. Regarding Meli Delivery Day, think for the first time in our investor presentation, we have provided you with some details on slow shipment share. So you can see that more than 5% of our shipments were delivered with a slow method, most of which is coming from Meli Delivery Day, which basically means that we saw a good adoption of MDD whenever buyers were using their MeliMize offering to get free shipping in low ASP items. To your question on economics, I think we are seeing savings coming from that delivery model as more and more we can consolidate items in the same box and the same delivery route. But still, we think that there's ample room for the program to continue scaling and driving costs down even more through more density in routes, more items per box or even incremental transactions that could be delivered in the same delivery as well.

Speaker 12

So good progress so far. We are excited with the results that we've seen, but the opportunity there is also relevant.

Speaker 7

Thanks so much. Really appreciate it, everyone.

Speaker 4

One moment for our next question. Our next question comes from Craig Maurer with Feet Partners.

Speaker 15

Yes. Hi. Thanks for taking the question and happy anniversary. Wanted to ask about the ad penetration rate that moved up from 1.6% to 1.9%. Was this related to the GMV coming down in Argentina?

Speaker 15

Or was this an actual improvement in adoption? Thanks.

Speaker 12

Hey, Craig. Ariel here again. So we had a very strong quarter in ads. As you said, penetration went up 30 basis points Q on Q and revenues grew 64% in dollars year over year, almost 100% in constant currency. I think the increase in penetration is definitely not coming only from Argentina.

Speaker 12

We saw a consistent increase in penetration across every country. And Mexico actually presented the highest growth both in terms of dollars and in terms of revenues as a percentage of GMV. So overall, excited what happened this quarter and more importantly convinced that the opportunity we have in front of us remains to be big and we have many levers to continue capturing that.

Speaker 15

Can you just remind if there's any seasonality in that number that we should be watching out for?

Speaker 12

No, we don't think there's a specific reason on seasonality. We made several product improvements, both in terms of the algorithms that we use for the bidding processes. We made changes in our placements in our search results. So many moving parts that did help us get some acceleration there.

Speaker 15

Thanks very much.

Speaker 4

One moment for our next question. And our next question comes from caio Prado with UBS.

Speaker 16

Good evening. Hello, everyone. Thanks for the opportunity for asking questions. I have 2 here on my side, please. First, two questions on the Fintech, okay?

Speaker 16

First, on the accounting reconciliation that you made this quarter, if you could explain the rationale rationale behind this change and why did you decide to do this now? And the second is related to Mexico. If you could please help us to understand the strategy behind the syntax business there, specifically on the banking business. Is your plan is to compete with the syntax that are growing there or if this would be much more a financial arm for the marketplace business. Because looking to the financial industry there, seeing that not having a bank license makes the business much more than in Brazil, for instance.

Speaker 16

You need some partners probably for investments, lending. So just would like to understand your view on this and if you are planning any upgrades for your license there as well. Thank you.

Speaker 3

Hi, Caio, it's Martin here. In terms of the reporting update, as we explained on the investor letter, what we did is basically in the past we had the interest income and cost from the whole operation below EBIT. As we the Mercado Pago business evolved from being a wallet to being more of a digital banking business, a lot of the business was the float that we had on that particular operation, which we brought above or within EBIT right now. So we now recognize the interest that we generate as revenue and the cost that we generate as cost of goods sold. And that's a better reflection, a better reporting in terms of the nature of our business.

Speaker 3

And in fact, this is the way we have been managing our business for quite a while. So I think this is an improvement in terms of disclosures, and this is the reason why we did this at this point.

Speaker 8

Building on Martin's comment, definitely the time value of money has been an integral part of how we price our FinTech services, everything we do from acquiring, from when we pay salaries and even more so now with a larger offering in terms of FinTech services. So we believe that this reflects better how we look at the business and how this business is really a financial business. And with regards to the second question about Mexico and our strategy, our strategy is to be the largest fintech in Mexico. We will offer full fledged solution of products from acquired on the one hand to fintech services on the other one. And there we for a long time now, we have been able to offer our wallet.

Speaker 8

And on top of that, we have been doing credit for several years and a debit card for several years. Last year ago, 3 quarters ago, we launched our credit card, which is growing very, very strongly. And we work together with a 3rd party to offer a remunerated account, which is basically a money market, where money is available 20 fourseven in the Mercado Payo account. So we have a full offering, and we believe there's a huge opportunity that Mexico right now is going through a transformation similar to the one the market underwent in Brazil in the last 5, 7 or 10 years, where financial inclusion will increase a lot. With access to credit, we increase a lot, and we have a huge opportunity to be the leaders in this market.

Speaker 16

Okay. Thank you very much. This is clear. Any plans for a potential upgrade in your license in Mexico?

Speaker 8

Yes. Today, we are working with an IFA license and we are able to do what we want to do. We regularly reevaluate whether in the future we might need a different license. And if so, once we do anything, we will let you know.

Speaker 12

Okay. Thank you.

Speaker 4

And one moment for our next question. Our next question comes from Jamie Friedman with Susquehanna International Group.

Speaker 17

Hi, good evening. I wanted to ask a question about Argentina. So it looked like FX neutral growth in Argentina came in slower than inflation. And I think in your prepared remarks attributed that to reduced consumer demand. So I'm just trying to gauge that.

Speaker 17

Is that trend something that you are contemplating to continue? Because in the past, the pattern has been that Argentina revenue would consistently outgrow inflation. So is this a new reality that we need to consider?

Speaker 3

Hi, it's Martin here. I think we yes, I can talk about this quarter in which we saw a recession in Argentina slowdown in consumption. As you clearly mentioned, growth was high in nominal terms, but below inflation. And in fact, in dollar terms, it was also decreased from last year. As we are monitoring the situation in the country and we'll deal with a macro situation as it goes through in the year.

Speaker 3

As I mentioned earlier, we operate a marketplace that is very resilient to this type of situations. We have seen stations like this in passing, not only in Argentina, but in other markets and we'll come out strong. We have a very strong brand and we'll continue to manage the country as it is. On the FinTech side of the business, as I mentioned earlier, we are performing extremely well in Argentina given the market conditions. And on the commerce side, we are out performing the general retail industry.

Speaker 8

Let me compliment on the FinTech side. I'd say we have seen some deceleration in the point of sale business. However, the QR code, the wallet continues to go very strongly and above inflation. And we have been cautious on the credit side.

Speaker 17

And then if I could just follow-up switching gears on the Slide 18 and I apologize if you answered this, but I might have missed it. But the gross margin compression of 3.9% related to the change in shipping conditions, terms and conditions. What was that about?

Speaker 3

Yes. I think that's the fact that the margin is decreased because we have higher rates. So what we try to do in that page is try to explain to try to normalize the change that we include to better understand the results of this quarter. So because we had roughly $300,000,000 more revenues that we would have had, had not been made this change, that effectively increases the denominator, so that reduces the margin and this is what we adjusted there.

Speaker 17

Got it. Okay. Thank you.

Speaker 3

Make it comfortable. Sure.

Speaker 4

This concludes the question and answer session. I would now like to turn it back to Martin De Los Santos, CFO.

Speaker 3

Thanks everybody for joining. As we mentioned, we're very excited about the Q1 of our 25th year, particularly with the results that we saw in Mexico and Brazil, which we saw tremendous growth both in terms of Fintech and Commerce with also improving profitability. As we mentioned, the EBIT margin of Brazil and Mexico combined doubled year on year And that's the result of the commerce business doing very well in terms of ads, shipping efficiencies, the 1B business that it continues to improve profitability. And then the Fintechs business in Brazil and Mexico is also thriving, growing credit portfolio, growing very nicely and improving profitability as well as acquiring business is performing extremely well. And then as we continue to grow, we also gain operational leverage that is going through our P and L.

Speaker 3

As we mentioned on the bottom line in terms of net income, very strong net income growth year on year. So again, very excited about the results and looking forward to talking to you next quarter.

Speaker 4

Thank you for your participation in today's conference. This does conclude the program. You may now disconnect.

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Earnings Conference Call
MercadoLibre Q1 2024
00:00 / 00:00