Delivery Hero CEO Niklas Östberg speaks at the Noah technology conference in Berlin on June 13, 2019.
Krisztian Bocsi | Bloomberg via Getty Images
Delivery hero released preliminary financial results Monday, a week earlier than expected, showing the company grew sales in line with last year’s forecast and expects higher profitability in 2024.
The results, which are unaudited and based on preliminary information, were released early by the company in an effort to fend off last week’s investor flight over the food delivery giant’s asset sale strategy.
Here’s how the company did it:
Income: €10.5 billion ($11.3 billion) in annual revenue in 2023, versus the €10 billion forecast by analysts, according to LSEG data
Adjusted EBITDA (earnings before interest, taxes, depreciation, and amortization): Delivery Hero says adjusted EBITDA “exceeded” €250 million ($269.4 million). Analysts had forecast an adjusted EBITDA of 254.3 million euros, for LSEG
Delivery Hero said GMV (gross merchandise value), or the combined value of overall orders on its platforms, grew 6.7% year-on-year to 12.3 billion euros in the fourth quarter of 2023 and 6 .8% to 47.6 billion euros. throughout the year 2023.
Total segment revenue increased 15.7% to $3 billion in the fourth quarter. Annual sales amounted to 11.1 billion euros, up 15.7% year-on-year.
This matches company guidance for “approximately 15% year-over-year.” [year-over-year]”growth in 2023.
Adjusted EBITDA, which is Delivery Hero’s measure of profitability, totaled more than 250 million euros in full-year 2023, Delivery Hero said, and the company reported an adjusted EBITDA margin of 0.6%.
Delivery Hero said the results were driven by healthy order growth in many of its geographies.
Notably, Delivery Hero also provided rosy guidance for 2024, with the delivery company forecasting group GMV growth of 7-9% for the year, higher than its performance in 2023.
Delivery Hero said it expects segment revenue growth of between 15% and 17% in full-year 2024 and adjusted EBITDA of between 725 and 775 million euros.
The company also expects positive free cash flow for the year.
Delivery Hero said it will release additional preliminary numbers for the fourth quarter in a business update scheduled for Feb. 14, when it was originally supposed to release the numbers.
This comes after Delivery Hero shares lost more than 26% of their value last week, sliding to their lowest price since 2022, as investors reacted to a mix of news regarding portfolio asset sales.
On Tuesday, Delivery Hero said it would sell its entire 4.5% stake in British food delivery company Deliveroo for 76.8 million pounds ($97 million), far less than the price it paid for the shares in 2021.
Then on Friday, Delivery Hero shares fell sharply after a report said the company had halted talks to sell some assets within its Southeast Asia food delivery business Foodpanda to Singapore’s Grab.
Delivery Hero denied the report, issuing a statement saying that all rumors that negotiations for the potential sale of Foodpanda’s assets had failed were “false” and that talks are ongoing.
Delivery Hero is one of the largest food delivery services globally with over 2.2 billion users.
It competes with the likes of American giant DoorDash, Britain’s Deliveroo, Anglo-Dutch company Just Eat Takeaway.com, Singaporean company Grab and Indonesia-based Gojek.