Adevinta Annual Report 2020
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Adevinta Annual Report 2020 Creating perfect matches on the world’s most trusted marketplaces Index Adevinta at a glance 1 Global presence 2 Message from the CEO 4 The Board of Directors of Adevinta ASA 8 Board of Directors’ report 10 Sustainability statement 18 Statement of Corporate Governance 38 Consolidated financial statements 46 Parent company financial statements 140 Independent Auditor’s Report 157 Share information 162 OUR MISSION Create perfect matches on the world’s most trusted marketplaces. OUR PURPOSE Make a positive change in the world by helping everything and everyone find new purpose. OUR STRATEGY With trusted brands that enjoy leading market positions, Adevinta operates a resilient business model at the centre of the second-hand economy at a time when consumers are seeking more sustainable and cost-efficient ways of buying products. The bulk of the Group’s classifieds revenues are from professional customers who depend on recurring, subscription-based listing packages. To ensure the Group remains at the forefront of the digital economy, Adevinta is investing in new products and technology and believes this is its best long-term differentiator. A T A G L an C E Adevinta at a glance We are a global online classifieds specialist, operating in 11 countries. We provide digital services to connect buyers and sellers, and facilitate transactions, from job offers to real estate, cars, consumer goods and more. Adevinta’s portfolio spans more than 30 digital products and websites, attracting 1.3 billion average monthly visits. Leading brands include top-ranked leboncoin in France, InfoJobs and Milanuncios in Spain, and 50% of fast- growing OLX Brazil. The Group employs 4,700 people committed to supporting users and customers daily. Expected acquisition of eBay Classifieds Group In July 2020, Adevinta agreed to acquire eBay Classifieds Group. Upon completion, this acquisition will transform Adevinta into a globally scaled pure-play online classifieds leader, with leading market positions in 16 countries covering one billion people and with around three billion monthly visits. REVENUE¹ €727m 2019: €740m EBITDA² €194m 2019: €206m 1 Operating revenues including joint ventures 2 EBITDA including joint ventures Adevinta Annual Report 2020 1 Global presence with multiple leadership positions 4,700¹ EMPLOYEES AROUND THE WORLD 11 COUNTRIES WHERE WE OPERATE DIGITAL MARKETPLACES 1.3bn VISITS TO OUR SITES EACH MONTH ¹ As at 31 December 2020 including joint ventures 2 Adevinta Annual Report 2020 GL oba L L presen C E Austria Ireland 2 Belarus Italy Brazil Mexico Spain France C:0 / M:63 / J:91 / N:0 C:22 / M:100 / J:78 / N:16 United Kingdom Germany 2 2 ICONS Leading position Hungary Generalist Cars Real estate Jobs 2 To be divested upon completion of the eCG acquisition Adevinta Annual Report 2020 3 Message from the CEO Delivering on our commitment to growth Nobody could have I said in 2019 that establishing Adevinta as an independent anticipated the disruption organisation and a global champion in online classifieds gave us a ‘licence to expand’. Our aim was to be better positioned to lead that businesses worldwide in the consolidation of our industry. Our acquisitions in 2020 would face as a result of underline that we are delivering on our promise. In October, we boosted our presence in Brazil’s online real the Covid pandemic. estate classifieds when our equal joint venture OLX Brazil acquired Grupo Zap in a move that positions us as a key player in the real estate market. The acquisition closed on schedule Our top priorities throughout the year were to ensure our sites and at year end integration was progressing well. We see remained fully operational, to engage and support our users and huge potential for digitisation in this sector, with numerous customers, and to protect the health and safety of our employees. opportunities to create integrated solutions that enhance the experience of buying, selling or renting properties. While we started the year with strong positive momentum, the Covid crisis changed the business environment dramatically in In July 2020, Adevinta announced a much bigger and truly all our markets. However, recovery was encouragingly swift in game-changing transaction with the exciting news that we had many parts of our operations and this was helped by strong agreed to acquire eBay Classifieds Group. Upon completion, cost-saving initiatives. The Group achieved a robust this acquisition will transform Adevinta into a globally scaled performance in extremely challenging circumstances. pure-play online classifieds leader, with leading market positions in 16 countries covering one billion people and with Adevinta’s operating revenues1 in 2020 were €727 million (2019: around three billion monthly visits. The breadth of talent and €740 million). This small decrease was mainly due to a weaker experience across the combined companies will help us performance in Spain and our Global Markets, although this was optimise assets at different stages of development, accelerate partially offset by an improved performance in France, which monetisation and create value for users and advertisers. It will increased its overall revenue. There was a healthy improvement in add significant strengths in areas such as new products and core classifieds revenue in most markets, while advertising services, as well as centralised expertise for data, advertising, revenue was on a soft positive trend. EBITDA1 decreased from product and technology. €206 million to €194 million, representing a 27% margin, down two percentage points year-on-year. Net cash flow from operating We also continued our portfolio optimisation to ensure we activities was €105 million, down 22% year-on-year. capture the right growth opportunities. We completed four divestments during the year, beginning in June 2020 with I am very proud of how our teams responded to the challenges Corotos in the Dominican Republic, and continuing in October Covid presented. I applaud the way they reached out so 2020 with Avito in Morocco, Tayara in Tunisia and Fincaraíz in effectively to our staff around the world as the majority of our Colombia. In February 2021, we sold Yapo in Chile. The new people made the transition to working remotely. Our response owners have an emerging markets expertise and local focus was equally encouraging on the customer side. We engaged that will help these businesses reach their full potential. During with our professional customers so that we could understand the respective transition periods, we will provide the necessary the specific difficulties they faced and support them with support to achieve a smooth handover. tailored solutions. We helped our customers restart their activities as soon as they could safely do so, and our Integration process of eBay Classifieds Group personalised approach was very well received. is on track Our immediate task will be to integrate the businesses More significantly, our business model has proven its resilience successfully and realise the revenue and cost synergies we during the Covid crisis. The demand for reduced physical identified. At the end of 2020, the integration process planning interaction and increased digitalisation has encouraged us to was very much on track. On the revenue side, we will benefit continue developing our product and technology capabilities. from sharing best practices and playbooks across our 1 Including joint ventures 4 Adevinta Annual Report 2020 M essage F rom T H E C eo The Group achieved a robust performance in extremely challenging circumstances markets. For example, the acquisition sees Mobile.de, Germany’s biggest online vehicle marketplace, bring valuable expertise we can deploy around the Group. Equally, Adevinta’s leading online classifieds generalist in France, leboncoin, has successfully entered new verticals and built a strong transactional model, and this experience and know-how can add huge value throughout our portfolio. There are also opportunities to develop new advertising products, and to reduce cost and increase efficiency by consolidating and simplifying our product and technology infrastructure. Driving our business model through technology Our agreement to acquire eBay Classifieds Group is an excellent development because upon completion it will give us unparalleled scale in technology and talent. Technology plays a key role in the evolution of our business model, and I continue to underline the importance of investing in our products and technology. Having world-class products, and the right people to build them, are essential to our success. Consumer behaviour has been changing for many years, and the drive for more convenience, trust and transparency, as well as the shift towards more sustainable consumption, has amplified the role of online marketplaces. In 2020 and into 2021, the Covid pandemic has proven the value of stay-at-home shopping and further accelerated the pace of change. We significantly strengthened our product and technology capability in 2020 with the implementation of new transactional solutions at leboncoin in France. These solutions allow us to support the complete consumer journey and include peer-to-peer payment, trust profiles and ratings, fraud detection and delivery. The transactional model allows us to tap into important new revenue streams and we will use the leboncoin playbook to strengthen the monetisation of all our generalist classifieds platforms over time. The way we have developed our transactional model is one of our biggest strategic achievements this year, and we will focus heavily on this going forward. Becoming fully transactional is a key part of our strategy alongside a commitment to becoming the industry leader in Motors and Real Estate. Adevinta Annual Report 2020 5 Message from the CEO continued The power of our people No review of our operations in 2020 would be complete without thanking our employees for their loyalty throughout the year. During the many challenges we faced in 2020, I was delighted to see increases in the Group’s employee engagement scores.