Zozo Inc Ord

It is time to start the full year financial results announcement of ZOZO for FY 2023 ending in March 2024. We will only be offering live streaming this time. We plan to have the session until 5.35 p.m. After that, we will have a Q&A session with institutional investors on a separate Zoom channel from 5.50 p.m. I'd like to introduce the two presenters. Representative Director, President and CEO, Kotaro Sawada. Hello. Director, Executive Vice President and CFO, Koji Yanagisawa. Hello. Now CFO Yanagisawa will take us through the business results. Hello, I'm Yanagi Sawa, CFO. I'd like to walk you through the full year financial results for the fiscal year ending in March 2024. And the presentation document we will be using today has already been uploaded to the IRR page of our website, so please take a look. Let's jump right in. Here are the highlights of this quarter. As for FY2023, our gross merchandise value GMV rose by 5.5% year-on-year, amounting to 574.3 billion yen. Our GMV, excluding other GMV, went up 7.1% year-on-year, landing at 536.9 billion yen. Operating profit rose by 6.5% year-on-year, landing at 60 billion yen. Operating profit margin OPM was 11.2%, decreasing by 0.1 point year-on-year for the full year. In terms of the achievement rate against the company plan, it was 98.9% for GMV, but GMV excluding other GMV, which is what we focus on, turned out to be 100.3%, and it was 100.1% for OP, and both have reached the targets. GMV for Zozotown business trended lower than the plan, impacted by the abnormal weather, but GMV for Yahoo Shopping, thanks to the effect of active promotions, trended significantly higher than the plan. Thus, GMV excluding other GMV, which directly impacts the margin, achieved the target. Despite some expenses exceeding the plan, OP also surpassed the plan due to successful cost reductions and cost controls and shipping expenses accompanied by order value increases. Both GMV and OP reached record highs. Here are the quarterly consolidated financial results. In the fourth quarter announced accounting period, GMV excluding other GMV grew 6.4% year-on-year. Because of the amount of the provision for bonuses was reduced compared to the previous year and the company was cost-conscious, the operating profit increased by 22% year-on-year. which is quite high. The operating margin was 10.5%. Next, I'd like to share the details of our business results. Let's look at the increase decrease analysis of the operating profit as of the end of the fourth quarter. OP was 56.42 billion in the previous fiscal year. In 2023, it amounted to 60.07 billion, up by approximately 3.65 billion. And by the way, Yahoo Shopping was renamed Line Yahoo Commerce from this fiscal year. Since Zozo Yus set up a shop in Yahoo Auction in March of 2024, Line Yahoo Commerce figure is now the sum of Yahoo Shopping and Yahoo Auction. Factors attributable to the growth of the OP were plus $10.09 billion from the gross profit growth resulting from Zozotown and Line Yahoo Commerce GMV expansions, plus $1.96 billion from the sales increase generated by the advertising business, and plus 1.43 billion from the growth of shipping revenue and others coming mainly from the GMV expansion. So those are the three factors attributable to the growth On the other hand, factors that drove down the OP were the four following reasons. Minus 2.51 billion from the increase in fixed costs impacted by the rise in the number of employees and logistics bases and others. And minus 3.51 billion from the increase in variable costs that rose in correlation to the GMV. And 1.43 billion from the increase of actual promotion related expenses associated mainly with point related expenses. And fourthly, 2.38 billion from other expenses such as the purchase of equipment to start the operation of the new logistic base, increasing cloud server expenses and transferring of some outsourcing commissions to other accounts. Next, this is page 12 of the handout. This is about the balance sheet. The treasury stock purchases were completed on March 4th, 2024 as scheduled. And next, here are the cash flow trends, page 13 of the handout. I'd like to explain two special variable factors. First, cash flows from investing activities included expenditures for the opening of the new logistics center, which impacted both the previous and the current fiscal years, and cash flows from financing activities were used for the acquisitions of the treasury stocks. Next, this is the breakdown of SG&A expenses. The SG&A to GMV ratio was 22.9% flat from the previous year. The main factors that drove down the SG&A ratio are the following four reasons. First, due to a change in the amount of the year-end bonus payment and recording of the parts of the engineering personnel costs going to software asset costs, payroll costs for employees under payroll costs for employees under payroll And staff costs decreased by 0.2 points. And secondly, the outsourcing commission decreased by 0.2 points due to the transfer of some expenses that have been included in the outsourcing commission in the previous fiscal year to other accounts. And thirdly, the order value turned out to be higher than in the same period of the previous year. And this resulted in a 0.3 point shipping cost decline. And fourthly, due to a change in the use of actual promotion expenses, point related expenses ratio rose year and year. And thus the advertising expenses came down by 0.3 points. On the other hand, key factors that drove up the SG&A ratio are the following four. Increased inventory supply and the warm winter deteriorated the stock turnover ratio and led to the lowering of operating efficiency resulting in a 0.1 point decrease in logistics related expenses under payroll and staff costs. A new logistic base started its operation and thus the rent expense increased by 0.2 point. And thirdly, depreciation rose by 0.3 point as the depreciation of the material handling equipment kicked off with the start of the new logistic base operation. And fourthly, others increased 0.3 point mainly due to the purchase of equipment for the new logistic base operation. An increase in cloud server expenses and a change in how to recognize the outsourcing commissions. Next is page 27, breakdown of SG&A expenses by quarter. In the fourth quarter accounting period, the SG&A expenses to GMV ratio was 22.9%, down 1.8 points from the... same period last year. The two main reasons for the decrease in the SG&A ratio are as follows. First, as it was indicated before, compared to the previous year, the amount recorded as the year-end bonus decrease leading to a 0.8 point decrease in payroll costs for employees against the G&V ratio under payroll and staff costs. And secondly, a 1.1 point decrease in advertising expenses over GMV in comparison with the same period of the previous year due to the impact of reduced spending on measures to attract customers. Here are the actual promotion related expenses trend in the fourth quarter. Our actual promotion related expenses, which is the sum of the advertising expenses and the point related costs, turned out to be 4.0% of GMV. The year-to-date promotion expenses from the beginning of the year to GMV ratio was 4.1% as planned generally. Next, let's go to page 24. Here are the OPM and OPM trends. Although fixed costs increase in the fourth quarter due to the expenses for a new logistic base and other factors. However, the company was able to curb some costs and mainly variable costs and OPM increased by 1.4 points from the same period of the previous year and landed at 10.5%. Moving on to page 28 and onward. These are the main KPIs of Zozotown. And by the way, the KPIs hereafter do not include the results of our online Yahoo commerce or B2B business. The number of total buyers was down by 9,000 from the previous quarter amounting to 11.68 million of which active members was 10.78 million increasing by 50,000. Guest buyers decreased by 60,000 finishing at 890,000. The number of active members increased less than expected. The effects of the warm winter during the main winter sales period and the cold temperatures since the start of the spring shopping season slowed down the acquisition of new members. This was the main factor. And because the increase of active members was exceeded by the decrease of guest buyers, the number of total buyers decreased slightly from the previous quarter. Next, this is the number of shops on Zozotown. As of the end of the fourth quarter, the number of shops was 1,595, a net decrease of 10 shops from the end of the previous quarter. We welcomed 17 new shops to our platform this quarter. To name a few, we now have Korean online fashion store, Musinka, Korean brand popular among the young segment, Maldi McReady, a Shiseido group brand, NARS. Although we were able to invite new stores as planned, there were many store closures due to the consolidation of the brands and disappearance of the brands and other reasons. Thus, our number of shops slightly decreased from the previous quarter. Next, let's go to page 34 and 35. ARP and AOV. So with respect to the average retail price, it was 4,003 yen up by 0.4% year-on-year. The brands continue to increase their list prices for this fall and winter season, but the ARP was at the same level as the previous year. The main factors were that outerwear and other expensive items did not sell as much because of the warm winter and also the sales ratio increased. So these are the main factors. Now let's look at the average order value. The AOV was 8,735 yen, up 5.2% year-on-year. Although the average retail price was flat, the number of items purchased per order increased. bringing the average order value higher than last year. The number of items per order increased because we gave more days to free shipping on purchases over 12,000 yen or more promotions than last year. And the ratio of combined purchases rose thanks to it. And next, I'd like to share our business plan for the ongoing FY2024. This is page 37. Here are the full year consolidated earnings forecast and dividends for the ongoing fiscal year. GNV plus 6.1% from the previous year, 609.2 billion yen. GNV excluding other GNV plus 6.6%, 572.2 billion yen. Net sales plus 8.8% from the previous year, 214.4 billion yen. OP plus 6.9%, 64.2 billion yen. And OPM 11.2% or higher are the plans. We will continue to target a dividend payout ratio of 70% or higher. The dividend per share is expected to be 107 yen. Here are the FY2024 targets by business segment. For Zozotown business, we aim to keep growing by continuing to expand the number of buyers and increase the usage rate of Zozotown within fashion consumptions. In addition, outright purchase production and sales of Zototown business is forecasted to be a minus 41.3% from the previous fiscal year in consideration of the repercussions of the large contribution to sales made by the collaboration project implemented in the previous fiscal year. As mentioned at the beginning, Yahoo Shopping was renamed to Line Yahoo Commerce. For Line Yahoo Commerce, we will continue to aim for double-digit growth supported by the sales promotions of Line Yahoo. Lastly, I'd like to report on the results of the shareholder return initiatives announced as of October 31st, 2023. First, regarding dividends, because the bottom line trended higher than originally planned, the year-end dividend of 49 yen would have resulted in a payout ratio of less than 70%. Therefore, we have revised our dividend forecast today. As a result, the year-end dividend will be 55 yen, the total dividend will be 104 yen, and the payout ratio will be 70.2%. Next is about the acquisitions of treasury stocks. The repurchase period was from November 1st, 2023 to March 4th, 2024. The total number of shares repurchased turned out to be 3,129,000 shares. and 900 shares, and the total amount of acquisition was 9,999,443,450 yen. The repurchase was completed as planned. And finally, in terms of the cancellation of Treasury stocks, on November 9, 2023, 11,170,104 shares were canceled. As a result of these efforts, ROE for the fiscal year ending March 31st 2024 remain high at 55.0 the company will continue to aim for a total payout ratio of over 80 including share buybacks generally on a five-year average from the fiscal year ending march 31st 20 20 20 24 and onward that's it from my side i'd like to hand the mic over to The water okay so now from here on, I like to share with you our business or review, please take a look at this chart. Last year. We share this with you. quite a similar chart at least um. And we have reached 530 billion yen already. As I mentioned last year, we focused on increasing the number of active members and also increasing the ZOZO penetration within fashion purchases. And we believe that we'll be able to potentially target 800 billion yen. So these are the target numbers we have in mind as we move forward. Next slide, please. And then not only that, We're also going to focus on other areas as well, other parts of retail market and also overseas markets. And I believe that we did mention that last year during the announcement session. So today I'd like to touch on the things that we have newly launched after last year. So for number one, which is to attract a broader range of customers. Last year, we did try out different initiatives. For us to narrow down the target, we have engaged in many initiatives. And the target that we like to focus on are the young target, the the late teens. So how could we encourage them to use Zozotown more? So we focused on that as we implemented different initiatives. So you may know this already, but we sponsored a K-pop artist event. And not only that, we also implemented other activities as well to attract the young audience. And another segment that we put importance on is the families, and we call them the moms, the mom segment. So this segment, is in charge of the purse strings for the kids and the entire households. So this is our target for fashion. As you can see here, we hired Yumi Adachi for a key visual. And we also produce the videos to actively engage in the promotions to attract the segment. And then as a result of this, this is just one example. And then what this chart indicates is the following. So the late teens women for this specific segment, we always conduct research On them, and then this indicates the recall rate and recall is you have this question on the screen when you think of buying fashion products. Please tell us up to you know, please tell us the places, you would think of, and then we asked this question to. The people and then you can see. other company names as well. And then there was a company name that rose in a short period of time, but we took actions against them. And then we were able to increase gradually our recall rate within this segment. And other than that, we are also doing other things to really zero in on this segment. And we're starting to see our initiatives come to fruition to a certain level. this year. And next, this is the improvement of purchase frequency per customer. So it's about growing to the right-hand side. So we did use this chart last year as well. So simply said, before the selling part, It says here, communicate. So we have this phase that we're calling communicate. So what types of fashion exists for you? And then what may look good on you? So we offer different services in this phase so that we'll be able to increase the number of touch points. We established a Niao Lab last year and a Niao TV two years ago. And then we also set up an experimental store, a physical store for the first time for Zozo called Niao Lab last year. And about Niao Lab, I don't know if you remember this, but we're coupling AI and human stylists to offer super personalized styling. So that was the concept of Neon Lab. And thankfully, we were able to offer this service to people. And of course, we needed to offer styling that makes the visitors happy. But through this initiative, we wanted to come to a solution to find out what would look good on who. And then we wanted to bring the know-how to online. So that was the very concept of Nia Lab. And for the interest of time, I won't be able to go into details on this, but on May 9th, where was updated, and then the renewal of where was injected with the know-how that we got through NEOW Lab Initiative. And then we are going to hold a press conference, so we will give you more information there, but I just wanted to give you a heads up on that today. And so how do we propose outfit, clothes that actually look good on that person? And what does that mean for a fashion platform? So this indicates the plotting of each individual of those who came into NeoLab. And then on the X axis, you have data from before the experience. And then we looked at how many times they have accessed Zozotown. in 30 days. And then we look at the same person after they experienced this initiative. So you see people that didn't change anything plotted out as well, but you can see that you see more dots on the top left part of the chart. So what this means is that we're not really push selling anything at Niao Lab. So this is done in a very natural way, but we are offering things that style well with them, that look good on them. And then when they experience it, they want to buy more fashion items. That's the tendency. And then, so we are quite already good at selling. fashion items but we're now focused on the upstream which is to offer personalized styling know-how so that we can uh showcase things that would look good on them actually so the next question is how do we turn it into ai how do we turn it into online know-how. So during the WARE press conference, I hope that we'll be able to offer you more information around this. And this is more supplementary information. So we want to establish an upstream cycle in our infrastructure. And it's not just going to be done with Niao Lab. There's fans, introduction of fans. So we will let the store staff download this app. And then through that app, they'll be able to post their styling coordination photos and then where we'll be able to gather this data and then the quality of where will go up because of this and then also we'll be able to offer more styling And we believe that that's going to have an uplift on Zozotown sales as well. And then we are also displaying inventory data of physical stores as well. And then the number of brand stores with inventory data on Zozotown is also increasing. And then this ecosystem is now better established. So that was quite long, but that was about number two, which was improvement of purchase frequency per customer and how to style people in context to that. And the third one is the production support. So we had our private brand before, but it's not about that. This is for the brands to use us for production support. And then the number of production types or models increased to about three times more. And then the number of units produced increase to 136% of the previous year's results. So the number of units produced is pretty much the same as the number of pieces sold. So sell, make, then judge based on data has become rather widespread. And then we have a production site in China, and it seems like we have been able to have a steady results. So how could this be used or utilized We're getting more visibility on that. So as you can see here, it's a pair of pants with the same design, and then we are already selling them. So at the initial phase, you can just come up with one model. Mono color just one one you know type one model and then, if it has a good start and then you can have this data, you can get this data. quickly you'll be able to make a decision to produce more and then, when you do that you'll be able to have more color variations or you can have more number of fabrics. And then we'll be able to have higher coverage of the users. And then the sales for this particular example increased by four times. So we're not just doing made to order. We'll be able to give brands knowledge about what sells. And we'd like to continue to support the brands by offering such production support. Next. is about going into other categories in apparel EC. So I want to first talk about cosmetics. So our GMV amounted to 11.3 billion yen, including Yahoo shopping sales. So last year, we landed a little short of 10 billion, which was rather unfortunate. But this year, we've been able to exceed 10 billion. So we are one of the largest selling places for cosmetics. And then the percentage of active members who purchase cosmetics is now about 23.6%. And then we were able to open all sorts of different cosmetic brands. So we have department store cosmetic brands, and we have quite a wide coverage. And we'd like to continue with this effort this year as well. And on the other hand, when it comes to link sales, we're hitting a ceiling to a certain level. So we want to raise our recall rate for cosmetics as well. So we want people to associate purchases of cosmetics to Zozotown more. And so what's next after cosmetics category? So I'm sorry, it's a little bit ambiguous in the way we're describing this, but we do have some idea already about the next category. So we're preparing for that. And then last part is about monetization of technology. So this is Zola Fit. In North America, we are rolling out the service so people will wear a zozo suit and then you'll be able to have a 3D rendering model of your own body. And then you'll be able to get a target body measurement as well and This is an American service, though it's not really well known here in Japan. But actually, this January, we upgraded this service significantly. And we were able to overcome this hurdle, technological hurdles. And then what this means is that we no longer require zozo suits. So of course, I mean, you can't wear baggy clothes to get the measurement, but as you can see, if you are dressed like this in the video, you'll be able to get a similar accuracy level of measurement as when you're wearing a Zozo suit. Before you needed to purchase a Zozo suit, wear it. and then do the measurement, but that's not going to be required anymore. So the business model could change. And then we launch a subscription version of this. And then the number of downloads is increasing significantly. And then this service, the number of downloads, of course, we want to increase that. But once again, the fact that we were able to establish this technology to get rather accurate body measurement with only marginal error, I believe that this is going to be useful for Japan business as well. And then, Just the other day, we launched this service called ZOZO METRE. So this is a service in Japan. Sorry for making it a little bit complicated, but this will require ZOZO suit. So this is a measurement with... only marginal errors. And then we thought that there is a demand, especially for B2B for this. So that's the hypothesis of what we base this business on. So you'll be able to find the optimum item for like body suits. So that demand actually does come up when we interview businesses. So we wanted to launch this as a service and see if this expands. And of course, this is something that we want to turn into the one that does not require Zozo suit in the future. So that is all, sorry. There's one more question. page about sustainability. So last year, we had external evaluation bodies that have evaluated us rather positively. I'm not going to talk about details here, but we have been able to effectively communicate about our activities and we'd like to continue with this effort. That will be all from my side. Thank you. That concludes Zozo's full year financial results announcement for FY23 ending in March 2024. Thank you for your time and attention.