FILE PHOTO: The Delivery Hero's logo is pictured at its headquarters in Berlin, Germany, August 18, 2020. REUTERS/Fabrizio Bensch/File Photo
(Reuters) -German online takeaway food company Delivery Hero on Thursday reported stronger than expected growth it its second-quarter gross merchandise value and confirmed its full-year outlook on the back of higher order volumes.
Quarterly gross merchandise value or GMV, a common metric for delivery firms measuring the total value of all goods sold, grew 7.4% in constant currency terms to 11.89 billion euros ($13.24 billion), beating analysts' average forecast of 11.57 billion euros.
Its quickest-growing region was Middle East and North Africa (MENA), where it posted 28% GMV growth compared to a year earlier, excluding the effects of hyperinflationary environments in Turkey and Lebanon.
In Asia, Delivery Hero's core region that made up around one third of its global sales last year, GMV shrunk 5% amid stiff competition from the likes of Coupang and GS Retail's Yogiyo in South Korea.
The group's shares were up 3.6% by 0904 GMT after it also said it was preparing an initial public offering (IPO) of its Emirati subsidiary Talabat on the Dubai Stock Exchange, the latest shuffle in its regional brands after the $1.2 billion sale of the foodpanda business in Taiwan.
The stock has fallen around 85% from its January 2021 highs as investors shunned food delivery stocks after the pandemic-driven frenzy.
"It's a little bit in our DNA to constantly evaluate what we should be doing with our portfolio," interim Chief Financial Officer Marie-Anne Popp told Reuters, but did not provide further details on which investors were on board or how the company intended to use the proceeds from the IPO.
Deutsche Bank said in a research note that the planned IPO likely came as a surprise and would be received positively by the market.
($1 = 0.8981 euros)
(Reporting by Paolo Laudani and Éva Orsolya Papp in Gdansk; editing by Milla Nissi)
