--- title: "Naspers Earnings Call: Growth, AI Bets And Margin Trade-Offs" type: "News" locale: "en" url: "https://longbridge.com/en/news/291201889.md" description: "Naspers reported strong Q4 results with nearly €10B revenue and an 84% EBITDA surge, driven by Latin American ecosystem growth and AI efficiencies. Despite heavy investments in food delivery and AI tempering short-term margins, free cash flow turned positive. Management projects flat FY2027 EBITDA to prioritize long-term scale, citing competitive pressures in Brazil and ongoing recovery at Just Eat Takeaway." datetime: "2026-06-30T00:00:49.000Z" locales: - [zh-CN](https://longbridge.com/zh-CN/news/291201889.md) - [en](https://longbridge.com/en/news/291201889.md) - [zh-HK](https://longbridge.com/zh-HK/news/291201889.md) generator: "portal-rs" --- # Naspers Earnings Call: Growth, AI Bets And Margin Trade-Offs Naspers Limited ((NPSNY)) has held its Q4 earnings call. Read on for the main highlights of the call. ### End of Quarter Sale - 70% Off - Unlock powerful investing tools and data-driven insights with TipRanks Premium for more confident investment decisions. - Discover top stock picks and new investment opportunities through TipRanks' Smart Investor Newsletter. Naspers Earnings Call Highlights Growth Momentum And Strategic Investment Priorities. Management struck a confident tone on Naspers’ latest earnings call, emphasizing strong operational momentum and clear technology advantages while openly acknowledging near‑term profitability pressures. Revenue and EBITDA are rising sharply, free cash flow has swung positive, and multiple businesses are scaling fast, yet heavy investment in food delivery adjacencies and AI platforms is tempering short‑term margins. ## Revenue Scale And Outlook Naspers reported nearly €10 billion in revenue for FY2026, underscoring the scale it has reached across its global portfolio. Management laid out plans to lift this figure to more than €13 billion next year, with commentary also referencing guidance of about $12–$12.3 billion, framing a strong top‑line growth trajectory. ## EBITDA Surge And Free Cash Flow Turnaround Group EBITDA climbed to €1.3 billion, an 84% year‑over‑year increase that reflects improving profitability in several core units. Free cash flow has improved by €2.0 billion over the past two years, swinging from a €0.5 billion deficit to a €1.5 billion surplus, giving the group more financial flexibility to fund growth. ## Latin American Ecosystem Scale And Profitability The Latin American ecosystem now generates around $1.5 billion in revenue, growing more than 40% year‑over‑year as Naspers pushes beyond pure food delivery. Crucially, adjacent ecosystem activities, which now account for over half of the revenue mix, delivered more than $150 million in profit, validating the broader platform strategy. ## Explosive Growth In Grocery, Pharmacy And Fintech Adjacent categories are expanding at high double‑ and triple‑digit rates, with grocery growing about 50% over multiple years and pharmacy up roughly 70% year‑over‑year. Fintech businesses are growing close to 100% annually, including restaurant credit up 115%, infrastructure at 100%, and new vouchers up 60%, while travel player Despegar is rising around 30% overall and 40% in Brazil. ## AI And Technology Drive Cost Savings And Scale Naspers detailed significant AI advances, including an in‑house Large Commerce Model trained on about 100 million Latin American customers that cuts profile identification costs by roughly 90% in some uses. The company has launched ToqanClaw and Zapia across 70,000 agents, 12,000 apps and millions of restaurant partners and employees, embedding agentic AI into iFood and Just Eat workflows to boost efficiency. ## Operational Progress At Just Eat Takeaway Pilot cities for the new Just Eat Takeaway strategy are delivering over 25% growth in tested cohorts, suggesting the turnaround plan is gaining traction. Logistics and network optimization have already yielded about €5 million in monthly savings, equivalent to roughly €60 million on an annualized basis, achieved within weeks of implementation. ## Strength At OLX And Other Portfolio Businesses Classifieds platform OLX reported $480 million of EBITDA on the back of 16% top‑line growth, highlighting the resilience of this asset. PayU India is both growing and profitable, and other holdings such as Despegar and La Centrale are tracking on or ahead of investment cases, lending credibility to Naspers’ capital deployment choices. ## Capital Allocation And Ongoing Shareholder Returns Naspers is continuing with its open‑ended $5 billion share buyback program, which has helped drive a 13% increase in core headline earnings and a 24% rise in adjusted earnings per share. These buybacks have been largely funded by non‑core asset sales totaling around $2 billion last year and about $1 billion in the first quarter, while dividend inflows support cash returns. ## International Growth And Ecosystem Replication Rapido in India is growing at roughly 110–120% year‑over‑year, signaling strong traction in new geographies. Management plans to replicate its Latin American ecosystem playbook in India and Europe, building integrated commerce and AI capabilities across regions to create more diversified and scalable revenue streams. ## Profitability Trade‑Offs And Flat FY2027 EBITDA Executives were clear that heavier investment in iFood and Just Eat will weigh on near‑term group results, with EBITDA expected to be roughly flat in FY2027. The strategy is to sacrifice some short‑term margin expansion to position these platforms for larger, more durable profit pools over the medium term. ## Competitive Pressure In Brazil Raises Costs The company highlighted intensifying competition in Brazil, where what it called irrational subsidy behavior has driven up cost‑per‑order. Within iFood’s Hits business, Naspers is currently losing about 1.5 reais per order, though trends are moving toward breakeven as management seeks to balance growth and discipline in a heated market. ## Just Eat Takeaway Still In Recovery Mode Just Eat Takeaway remains on a recovery path, with year‑over‑year growth at minus 4%, an improvement from minus 9% previously. Management stated that reaching around 10% growth is needed to meet European ecosystem objectives, but warned that rollout complexity means translating pilot success into full‑market gains will take time. ## Working Capital Swings And Fintech Funding Needs Statutory cash flow showed a notable swing from a small inflow of roughly $10 million to a $570 million outflow in working capital. This was driven largely by movements in merchant receivables and payables and capital deployed into scaling fintech businesses, which management framed as a structural funding requirement of its growth strategy. ## Delivery Hero Stake Tension And Investor Criticism Management acknowledged frustration over limited flexibility with its Delivery Hero stake, which constrains strategic options around that holding. The team also addressed public investor criticism questioning strategy execution, describing it as reputational noise but not a driver of internal decision‑making. ## Execution Risks Around AI And Unified Platforms While AI initiatives like LCM and unified logistics platforms promise meaningful efficiency gains, management cautioned that rollout is complex and will take time. Only one country has moved to the new unified logistics platform so far, illustrating that scaling pilots across multiple markets carries operational and execution risk. ## Guidance And Medium‑Term Ambitions Looking ahead, Naspers reiterated a growth‑first stance, serving about 1 billion customers and 5 million partners on roughly €100 billion of GMV while targeting revenue above €13 billion next year and maintaining EBITDA around €1.3 billion. Management expects group profitability to stay roughly flat in FY2027 as it invests behind adjacencies, AI and logistics, aiming to unlock billions of euros in medium‑term profits and push ecosystem revenues, particularly outside pure food, beyond 50% of the mix. Naspers’ earnings call painted a picture of a company leaning hard into scale, technology and ecosystem expansion while accepting near‑term margin trade‑offs. For investors, the key takeaway is that strong revenue and cash flow trends, combined with disciplined capital returns and powerful AI capabilities, underpin a long‑term growth story that still carries execution and competitive risks, especially in food delivery. ### Related Stocks - [NPSNY.US](https://longbridge.com/en/quote/NPSNY.US.md) - [DESP.US](https://longbridge.com/en/quote/DESP.US.md) - [JTKWY.US](https://longbridge.com/en/quote/JTKWY.US.md) - [JET.UK](https://longbridge.com/en/quote/JET.UK.md) - [TKAYF.US](https://longbridge.com/en/quote/TKAYF.US.md) ## Related News & Research - [REG - Greencoat Renewables - Notice of Dividend Currency Exchange Rate](https://longbridge.com/en/news/296061885.md) - [PEB: Draft Medicare LCD, cost control, and capital raise position the company for growth](https://longbridge.com/en/news/296457482.md) - [ADNOC to bring in Reatile Group as minority investor in Shell South Africa business](https://longbridge.com/en/news/296580424.md) - [Harmony Gold forecasts FY26 EPS at 4,400-4,800 SA cents, up 90%-108%](https://longbridge.com/en/news/296614720.md) - [Madison Asset Management LLC Buys Shares of 96,659 Workday, Inc. $WDAY](https://longbridge.com/en/news/296474072.md) --- > **Disclaimer: This article is for reference only and does not constitute any investment advice.**