MercadoLibre - Q1 2024

Transcript

Richard Cathcart (Head of Investor Relations)

Hello, everyone, and welcome to the Mercado Libre Earnings Conference Call for the quarter ended March 31, 2024. Thank you for joining us. I'm Richard Cathcart, Mercado Libre's Investor Relations Officer. Today, we will share our quarterly highlights on video, after which we will begin our live Q&A session with our management team. Before we go on to discuss our results for the first quarter of 2024, I remind you that management may make or refer to, and this presentation may contain, forward-looking statements and non-GAAP measures. So please refer to the disclaimer on screen, which will also be available in our earnings materials on our investor relations website. With that, let's begin with a summary of our results.

Martín de los Santos (CFO)

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 MELI+ as a highlight. Our strategic investment in shipping 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. Mercado Pago also had a solid performance in Mexico and Brazil, with some of the highlights being the acquiring business growing at an accelerated rate sequentially in both countries.

We had a solid credit growth. The portfolio surpassing the $4.4 billion and growing strongly from last year, and a strong quarter for Mercado Pago credit card. We issued 1.5 million cards during this quarter, and the TPV reached $1.9 billion, 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. Investors can find a summary of the impacts on our financials in this quarter's shareholder's 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 operation grew strongly year-on-year once again, with margin expansion being driven by Mexico and Brazil. This reflects the combination of growth, scale, and cost efficiency that drives operational leverage. 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 by 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, and this is a great way to kick off Mercado Libre's 25th anniversary. Now, I'll pass over to Richard for more on the solid foundations we have built over the past 25 years, looking ahead for the next 25 years of Mercado Libre.

Richard Cathcart (Head of Investor Relations)

In 2024, Mercado Libre 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, Mercado Libre has a consistent track record of generating shareholder value since our IPO in 2007. 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.

We are the leading e-commerce platform in the region, which has significant potential for growth from new buyers and higher frequency as engagement and penetration of retail rise. By building the fastest and most extensive delivery network in the region, and by 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 ever-improving value prop, which drives more traffic and growth. We're also building one of the largest retail media platforms in the region, 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. 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 technology and know-how developed for our marketplace. We are one of the largest fintechs in this market and are well-placed for market share gains across the region. We are also building MELI+ with the ambition of being the largest and most valued loyalty program in the region 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. 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. Mercado Libre'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. As we look forward to the next 25 years, we're confident that the best is yet to come.

Operator (participant)

Thank you. At this time, we will conduct a question and answer session. As a reminder, to ask a question, you will need to press star one one on your telephone and wait for your name to be announced. To withdraw your question, please press star one one again. Joining us for the Q&A are Martín de los Santos, CFO, Osvaldo Giménez, Fintech President, and Ariel Szarfsztejn, Commerce President. Please wait while we compile our Q&A roster. Our first question comes from Andrew Ruben 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 units down five, it didn't strike us as a major decline, but you had a big hit on EBIT. So was hoping you could walk us through the situation during the quarter, where you had mismatch between revenue and costs, 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.

Martín de los Santos (CFO)

Hi, Andrew. How are you? Thank you for your question. This is Martin. Yeah, as you know, we in Argentina face two things happen. You know, the devaluation of Argentina, which reduced the size of our business, and as you know, Argentina is a high margin heavy 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 a marketplace which is very resilient to this type of situation. So I 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.

In terms of cost mismatch, I think we saw some inflation in terms of our shipping costs in Argentina. There was some pressure on that line of our P&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. Assets under 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. So overall, I think that's what you see in terms of operating income.

But then when you go below operating income, 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&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 an extraordinary quarter in Brazil and Mexico, but I'm sure we'll go in more detail later on in the call.

Speaker 5

Great. Thanks, Martin.

Operator (participant)

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

Richard Cathcart (Head of Investor Relations)

Hey, 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 and Mexico? And then, in Argentina, what percent of GMV is done by sellers with less than 10,000 Unidades de Valor Adquisitivo per month? And how much would the proposed tax cuts represent to those smaller sellers in terms of GMV? And what do 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.

Martín de los Santos (CFO)

... 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, we always see a reduced volume on those dates because typically in, in our countries, four consecutive holiday days. And in this quarter, in particular, it was a little stronger because last year, Easter fell on Q2, and this year it fell in Q1. So if you look at the, the numbers for March, they were affected by, by, by those four days, so there was a little bit of, of loss of volume, which will eventually reverse next quarter because the opposite happens, and will play in, in favor of, of April probably. So that's in terms of the, the volume-

Speaker 5

5%, is that, is that fair, given the...? Is that the way we should think about it?

Martín de los Santos (CFO)

Well, we don't disclose the month-by-month numbers, but I'd say in March, we probably lost five or six percentage points in that particular month. We'll see what happens in April when we announce Q2.

Speaker 5

Gotcha.

Osvaldo Giménez (Fintech President)

Hi, 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, two or three years now, and 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, and the majority are account to account. So this is a minor part of that volume; it's credit card transactions. And the way we built the networks is, when we built it a few years back, there was not a standard for credit card transactions.

We do those transactions in a way which are processed as online payment transactions. To be able to interoperate, we need two things. On the one hand, there's a technical requirement that those transactions need to be tokenized for the network to be secure. And on the other hand, we need to agree on commercial terms with the counterparties, which are likely to be banks and other wallets. We are in that process. We are already on our side able to process tokenized 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.

Martín de los Santos (CFO)

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 were referring to smaller merchants, it's a number that we don't disclose specifically. Thanks.

Speaker 5

Thank you, and again, congratulations.

Operator (participant)

One moment for our next question. Our next question comes from Marcelo Santos with J.P. Morgan.

Speaker 5

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

Martín de los Santos (CFO)

Hi, it's Martin here, Marcelo. Thank you for your question. I think, we mentioned before, yeah, Argentina had some tough micro situation. The devaluation also didn't help because, you know, when you look at the revenue pools of Argentina, because of the devaluation, by definition, it shrunk relative to the other countries. Also had some tough, macro and demand issues that affected, in particular, the commerce side of the business. But then also, our other, Brazil and Mexico grew extraordinarily high, extremely 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, so almost double the EBIT coming from other countries.

So as a result of that, as you can see, the current 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, you know, 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 devaluation, it's more normalized because there's lower tax losses. So at a net income level, the variance is not so high, okay?

I would focus a lot more on net income as a main metric to evaluate the results of Mercado Libre. As we have been saying in the past, you know, we were mentioning that there was a little bit of a distortion on the EBIT because of the effects in Argentina. Now it's behind. So I think in terms of the effect 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 5

Perfect. Thank you very much.

Operator (participant)

One moment for our next question. Our next question comes from Irma Sgarz with Goldman Sachs.

Speaker 5

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

Martín de los Santos (CFO)

Hi, Irma. It's Martin here. Yes, we have seen very good adoption of MELI+, and both in terms of MELI Delivery Day for those users that enroll into the MELI+ 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 MELI+, we are seeing them there, and we are super excited with those results. Obviously, that increases a little bit the cost of our shipping operations. We estimate that year-over-year, I don't 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 cost, but it's more than compensated by that incremental volume that we're generating through MELI+. And then in terms of your first part of the question, optimization, we think we are still at very early stages of optimizing MELI+. Remember, MELI+ comes MELI Delivery Day, which is a day of the week that the user chooses to get their products. So as we continue to scale the MELI+, 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 engagement and adoption so far.

Speaker 5

Yeah, that's very exciting. May I just ask about also the re-acceleration in TPV growth in Brazil? You highlighted new devices, and we know that you've been shifting upmarket, 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.

Martín de los Santos (CFO)

Hi, Irma. So there were two components to the acceleration of TPV in Brazil. I would say the most relevant one, the more 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. And 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 accelerated in Brazil. And just to complement that, Irma, in terms of monetization, as we disclosed on the investor presentation, you can see that we continue to increase the cross-selling of credit to our acquiring users, so that contributes to improve the profitability of that business.

Speaker 5

Very helpful. Thank you.

Operator (participant)

As a reminder, if you want to ask a question, please press star one one on your telephone. Our next question comes from Geoffrey Elliott with Autonomous.

Speaker 5

Hello, thanks very much for taking the question. The change in Mercado Envíos 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? What does this mean in practice for the business side, and why are you doing it? Why have you made this change in terms and conditions?

Martín de los Santos (CFO)

Hey, Geoffrey, this is Ariel here. So, we see the process on the opposite. So over the last four or five years, we've been switching from operating purely with national post offices and carriers across Latin America into building our own logistics network.

Ariel Szarfsztejn (Commerce President)

... Basically, that process has already occurred. 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.

Speaker 5

Okay, so, so it reflects kind of you taking the risk rather than a national postal service taking the risk?

Ariel Szarfsztejn (Commerce President)

Say that again?

Speaker 5

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.

Ariel Szarfsztejn (Commerce President)

We 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 hauls, et cetera, et cetera. So nothing new, no risk profile changes. Right now, it's just formalizing something that has been happening already.

Osvaldo Giménez (Fintech President)

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 5

Got it. Thank you.

Operator (participant)

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

Speaker 5

Hi, congratulations, and 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 the shift, shift in the mix of the risk cohorts. Could you please elaborate on that as to why the early delinquencies have increased, and what do you mean by shift to riskier cohorts? Thank you so much.

Osvaldo Giménez (Fintech President)

So there were two components to the increase in early 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. And so even though there are higher NPLs, these credits have been priced with an adequate spread, so it's not a source of concern there.

And the other factor that happened was the last week of March, the last week of the quarter, ended with four days that were either weekend or holidays, and therefore, collections were typically lower than typical, because during the last four days of the month, there was an invoice that would have been due in those days that was passed over to the following month. And there was a small effect for the fact that Good Friday and Good Thursday were the last two non-working days of the month.

Speaker 5

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. But given the fact that you're moving into riskier cohorts, which are priced accordingly, why such a sharp decline quarter-on-quarter? Thank you.

Ariel Szarfsztejn (Commerce President)

Hi, Neha, how are you? It's Martin here. I think, well, first, 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 a lower NIMAL product. On a sequential basis, typically Q1... Actually, let's put it away. 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. Q3 is seasonally lower month for collection, so that's normal. It's something that is expected, in addition to two other things happening.

Speed in terms of growth of our credit, credit card portfolio is also contributing to that, and also the fact that we accelerated originations of other products, and that generates more provisions upfront. Remember, we provision 100% of the losses upfront when we originate. So we have a Q, like Q1, where we accelerated sequentially the originations, that tends to put pressure on margin. But it's like Osvaldo mentioned, there's nothing to worry about. We continue to have very strong, solid margins at, at, NIMAL margins at 31.5 percentage points, so something that it's under control, and as expected.

Speaker 5

Is your 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?

Ariel Szarfsztejn (Commerce President)

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

Speaker 5

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

Ariel Szarfsztejn (Commerce President)

... No, we, no, it hasn't. We continue to have the same strategy as we had in the past, which is to continue to, you know, cautiously increase our credit book as we feel more confident in terms of our underwriting capabilities, as Osvaldo 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 many benefits. In addition to the credit card, users that start using the credit card use most of our other fintech products or bring their salaries into our account. They might take a loan, they might get insurance, start using the debit card, and so on. So this is an important part of our strategy, credit card.

Osvaldo Giménez (Fintech President)

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

Ariel Szarfsztejn (Commerce President)

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

Speaker 5

Perfect. Thank you so much. Very helpful.

Operator (participant)

One moment for our next question. The next question comes from Maria Clara Infantozzi with Itaú BBA.

Speaker 5

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. Does the company intend to start being more vocal on charging for their fulfillment services? How far are we from such a scenario? Thank you.

Ariel Szarfsztejn (Commerce President)

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

We just don't think it's the right time.

Speaker 5

Great. Thank you.

Operator (participant)

One moment for our next question. Our next question comes from Marvin Fong with BTIG.

Speaker 5

Good evening. Thanks for taking my questions, and congratulations on 25 years. So, a couple of questions. You know, I'd like to get a little more detail on origination. So I believe it was, you know, about the same growth rate as last quarter in dollar terms, but just curious if, you know, how much Argentina factored into that. So perhaps you could give us some detail by country, like, how originations performed. You know, 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, you know, if you could give us an idea, you know, 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, you know, saving on cost? And additionally, just maybe some idea of where that percentage could go over time. Thanks.

Osvaldo Giménez (Fintech President)

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 low, in dollar terms, significantly lower than what it was prior to the elections. And in Mexico, we are growing on a year-on-year basis, but the origination was similar to that of prior quarter.

Ariel Szarfsztejn (Commerce President)

And I would add to that, that we had a devaluation in the middle, so that also affects the growth rate 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 NPS, NPLs, of other regions, but we are cautious, as Osvaldo mentioned. Hey, Marvin, Ariel MELI Delivery Day, i 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 MELI Delivery Day, which basically means that we saw a good adoption of MDD whenever buyers were using the MELI+ 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. So good progress so far. We are excited with the results that we've seen, but the opportunity there is also relevant.

Speaker 5

Thanks so much. Really appreciate it, everyone.

Operator (participant)

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

Speaker 5

Yeah, 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, or was this an actual improvement in adoption? Thanks.

Ariel Szarfsztejn (Commerce President)

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. 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 5

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

Ariel Szarfsztejn (Commerce President)

No, we, we don't think there's a specific, a specific reason on, 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 5

Okay. Thanks very much.

Operator (participant)

One moment for our next question. Our next question comes from Caio Prado with UBS.

Speaker 5

Good evening. Hello, everyone. Thanks for the opportunity for asking question. I have two here, on my side, please. First, two questions on the fintech, okay? First, on the accounting reclassification that you made this quarter, if you could explain the 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 fintech business there, specifically on the banking business, if your plan is to compete with the fintech that are growing there, or if this should be much more a financial arm for the marketplace business. Because looking to the financial industry there, seems that not having a banking license makes the business much more difficult than in Brazil, for instance. You need some partners, probably for investments, lending.

Just would like to understand your view on this, and if you are planning any upgrades to your license there as well? Thank you.

Ariel Szarfsztejn (Commerce President)

Hi, Caio, 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 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. 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, of disclosures, and this is the reason why we did this, at this point.

Osvaldo Giménez (Fintech President)

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 sellers, 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. With regards to the second question about Mexico and our strategy, our strategy is to be the largest fintech in Mexico. We will offer a full-fledged solution of products from acquiring on the one hand, to fintech services on the other one. There we-

Martín de los Santos (CFO)

... for some, for a long time now, we have been able to offer our wallet, and on top of that, we have been doing credit for several years, and a debit card for several years. Last year, about three quarters ago, we launched our credit card, which is growing very strongly, and we work together with a third party to offer a remunerated account, which is basically a money market, but where money is available 24/7 in the Mercado Pago 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 five, seven, or 10 years, where financial inclusion will increase a lot, where access to credit will increase a lot, and we have a huge opportunity to be the leaders in this market.

Speaker 5

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

Martín de los Santos (CFO)

Yeah, today, we are working with an IFPE license, and we are able to do what we want to do. We regularly re-evaluate whether in the future we might need a different license, and if so, once we do anything, we will let you know.

Speaker 5

Okay. Thank you.

Operator (participant)

One moment for our next question. As a reminder, if you wish to ask a question, press star one one on your phone to get into the queue. Our next question comes from Jamie Friedman with Susquehanna International Group.

Speaker 5

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 you, in your prepared remarks, attributed that to reduced consumer demand. So I'm just trying to gauge that. Is that trend something that you are contemplating to continue? Because in the past, the pattern's been that Argentina revenue would consistently outgrow inflation, so is this a, you know, a new reality that we need to consider?

Martín de los Santos (CFO)

Hi, it's Martin here. Yeah, I can talk about this quarter, in which we saw a recession in Argentina, a 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 a decrease from last year. As we, you know, we are monitoring the situation in the country, and we'll deal with the macro situation as it goes during the year. But as I mentioned earlier, we operate a marketplace that is very resilient to these type of situations. We have seen situations like this in the past, in not only Argentina, but in other markets, and we'll, you know, 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 outperforming the general retail industry.

Osvaldo Giménez (Fintech President)

Let me comment 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 grow very strongly and above inflation, and we have been cautious on the credit side, and-

Speaker 5

Mm-hmm. Mm-hmm. 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?

Martín de los Santos (CFO)

Yeah, I think that's the fact that the margin is decreased because we have higher rates. What we try to do in that page is try to explain to normalize the change that we included to better understand the results of this quarter. So because we had roughly $300 million more revenues that we would've 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 5

Got it. Okay, thank you.

Martín de los Santos (CFO)

To make it comparable. Sure.

Speaker 5

Yep.

Operator (participant)

This concludes the question and answer session. I would now like to turn it back to Martín de los Santos, CFO.

Martín de los Santos (CFO)

Thanks, everybody, for joining. As we mentioned, we are very excited about the first quarter 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-over-year, and that's, you know, the result of the commerce business doing very well in terms of ads, shipping efficiencies. The 1P business continues to improve profitability, and then the fintech business in Brazil and Mexico is also thriving, growing, you know, credit portfolio, growing very, very nicely and improving profitability, as well as acquiring business, performing extremely well. And then as we continue to grow, we also gain operational leverage that is going through our P&L.

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.

Operator (participant)

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