Coupang poised to turn to black after smallest loss in Q1

South Korea’s e-commerce giant Coupang Inc. reported the smallest quarterly loss on strong product commerce business, raising hopes for a turnaround.

The New York Stock Exchange-listed company said on Wednesday its operating loss narrowed 23% to $205.7 million, an all-time low, from a year earlier. Its net loss also shrank 29.1% to $209.3 million, the smallest deficit ever.

Coupang’s product commerce unit, which includes its flagship same-day Rocket Delivery service in South Korea, achieved profitability for the first time in the company’s history with $2.9 million of adjusted earnings before interest, tax, depreciation and amortization (EBITDA). That compared with a deficit of $69.3 million a year earlier.

Coupang’s total net revenue rose 22% to a record $5.1 billion in the January-March period.

Bom Kim, Coupang's founder and CEO, reiterated his confidence in the company’s turnaround.

“There continues to be lots of unpredictable variables related to the reopening in the short term. But the long-term trajectory is very clear to us,” Kim said in an earnings call. “In any scenario, we'll continue to grow significantly faster e-commerce segment and continue to gain share across all of our categories.”

Investors cheered the earnings with Coupang shares surging 18.51% to close at $11.46 on Thursday.

Write to Jong-Kwan Park at pjk@hankyung.com
Jongwoo Cheon edited this article.