Adyen’s growth run continues in H1 2021
dLocal has often said it wants to be like Adyen. The good news is that fellow payment processor Adyen published H1 2021 results that showed a continued strong run buoyed by pandemic-accelerated digitisation.
The company saw processed volume increase 67% year-on-year to €216bn, while net revenue increased by 46% year-on-year to reach €445m. This is different from revenue as reported by dLocal, as it also accounts for the costs incurred from both financial institutions and goods sold.
Over 80% of the revenue growth experienced by Adyen was from existing merchants, with the company seeing churn of below 1%. However, it has also onboarded a number of high-profile new customers, including Airbnb and LVMH.
Looking regionally, North America was the biggest driver of growth, seeing an 80% year-on-year climb. It now accounts for 22% of Adyen’s net revenue. The Netherlands-headquartered company has also increased its licensing footprint as part of its efforts to grow globally, gaining a branch license in the US and acquiring capabilities in both the UAE and Japan.
Adyen attributes much of its success to the growing digitisation of commerce and the continued shift away from cash, although this does not mean entirely to ecommerce. The company reported strong growth in both its online and bricks-and-mortar businesses, with point-of-sale processed volume doubling to reach €22.8bn – 11% of the company’s overall processed volume. Travel, meanwhile, remains impacted by the pandemic, although the company did report a return to pre-pandemic levels towards the end of the quarter due to the start of reopening in North America and Europe.
Despite growing revenue and volume, Adyen’s take rate has been steadily dropping, and is now 20.6bp, compared to 23.6bp in H1 2020. The company (as with dLocal) describes this as a “natural consequence” of its business model, which focuses on generating incremental net revenue and onboarding volume at scale.
How does Adyen compete on cross-border pricing?
