Asos Revenue Falls, Reports First Half Loss

Online clothing retailer Asos (LON: ASC) reported its interim results on Wednesday, with revenue declining year-on-year and the company sinking to a first-half loss.

Asos also announced the appointments of Dave Murray as Chief Financial Officer and Executive Director and Christine Cross as an Independent Non-Executive Director.

For the 26 weeks to 3 March 2024, Asos posted adjusted revenue of £1.5 billion, down 18% year-on-year. Its adjusted pre-tax loss was £120 million, representing a 32.6% increase from last year.

Asos shares are down more than 20% this year and over 52% in the last 12 months as the company aims to tackle various headwinds.

The company's aim to turn stock into cash looks to be working so far, with Asos revealing it sold through 83% of its Autumn-Winter 2023 product in the first half.

Furthermore, over 60% of Asos' sales from products were excluded from promotions.

“Under our Back to Fashion strategy, we set out three priorities for the year – to offer the best and most relevant product, to strengthen our relationship with customers and to reduce our cost to serve,” said Asos CEO José Antonio Ramos Calamonte.

He added: “We have delivered on each of these in the first half of the year, including right-sizing our stock ahead of target to drive our best first half cash performance since 2017 and seeing excellent results in our Test & React model, which is growing at pace.

Calamonte believes the company is becoming faster and more agile.

Asos reiterated its full-year guidance. The company sees a sales decline of 5% to 15%, with adjusted EBITDA positive. However, it expects AEBITDA for FY25 to be “significantly higher” than FY23 and FY24.