Update on impact of COVID-19

Prosus N.V. (Prosus) (Euronext Amsterdam: PRX; JSE: PRX) (together with its consolidated subsidiaries, the "Group") provides an update on its response to the COVID-19 pandemic, and outlines its actions to safeguard its employees, customers and businesses as well as to support the communities in which it operates.

The Group is a global consumer internet group and one of the largest technology investors in the world. The Group’s businesses serve customers in more than 90 markets. The Group estimates that approximately one-fifth of the world’s population use products and services of businesses that the Group has built, acquired or invested in. The Group's diversified portfolio comprises businesses in high-growth sectors, including food delivery, online classifieds, payments and fintech, etail, online education, and social and internet platforms.

Safeguarding its employees, customers and businesses

The Group has monitored COVID-19-related developments in its markets and has implemented measures to limit the potential spread of the virus among its employees, its customers and persons connected to its businesses. The Group early-on implemented work-from-home policies and travel restrictions for its employees to help protect the health of its employees and those around them. For those employees directly serving customers, the Group has implemented measures designed to safeguard both them and its customers. In addition, the Group has implemented measures to support the key partners of its businesses.

• Food delivery: the Group has implemented several initiatives, including iFood making available over R$50million in support to restaurants and couriers in Brazil affected by COVID-19. In some instances, the Group's businesses have also: waived commissions charged by it to restaurants; reduced restaurant payment cycles to boost restaurants' liquidity; provided masks, gloves and thermal checks for "delivery-only kitchen" staff; and provided best practice guidelines for the health and safety of restaurant staff and couriers.

• Classifieds: the Group has: extended payment and delivery services to more categories of users, where possible; offered cameras to users for virtual real estate tours; and piloted car inspections by video in some of its automotive businesses. To support sellers on some of its marketplaces, the Group has extended the duration of listings and provided financial relief to support their ongoing business viability.

• Payments and fintech: PayU has rolled out a number of initiatives to help merchant partners across its markets, including “Startups helping Startups”, which allows businesses to collaborate to support COVID-19 efforts. These initiatives include collecting donations for hospitals at points-of-sale, and rolling out free digital training webinars on how merchants can adapt to trading online.

• Etail: eMAG is offering customers alternative ways to receive their purchases. These include enabling customers to collect their goods from hundreds of conveniently located lockers, which are sanitised multiple times a day, and contactless delivery, where drivers deposit packages outside customers’ homes. eMAG is also adding new offline retailers to its marketplace to help drive business for them.

The Group continues to respond to the developing situation, adhering to official guidance and applicable law and regulation to limit the potential spread of COVID-19.

Supporting the communities in which it operates

The Group is taking action at a group level and at a local company level to support its communities, particularly where it can use its technological expertise, global networks and resources to contribute to the response to COVID-19.

• Swiggy has launched a campaign to donate meals to persons in need in India. The public can also donate to this campaign. The campaign is currently donating approximately 35,000 meals per day, with a goal of distributing approximately 500,000 meals per day in the short-term.

• OLX is using its marketplace to help find homes for doctors and arrange transportation for the elderly, and is moderating fake advertisements.

• Codecademy has awarded 85,000 scholarships to learners in more than 80 countries to the Pro version of its course catalogue, and BYJU’S has offered its learning platform for free in India.

Prosus's parent company, Naspers, is contributing ZAR1.5 billion (US$82 million) in emergency aid to the South African government’s response to COVID-19. Naspers was founded in South Africa over 100 years ago and it is committed to working with the South African government and civil society to help overcome the impact of COVID-19 and make a difference in the country. Naspers will contribute ZAR500 million (US$27.3 million) to the Solidarity Response Fund and will buy ZAR1 billion (US$54.7 million) worth of personal protective equipment and other medical supplies in China and fly these to South Africa

The Group continues to encourage the entrepreneurial and innovative spirit of its local teams to identify additional opportunities to put its capabilities and expertise to work across the world.

Business and financial impact

The Group's leadership team is in communication with its businesses to anticipate the impact of COVID-19 on operations. It is still too early to estimate the scope of any impact, whether positive or negative, on the Group's operations and financial information, particularly in view of rising global infections and evolving government responses to the outbreak. The size of the impact on operations will vary across sector and geography. The Group intends to continue to invest in its businesses to position them for future recovery.

Importantly, the Group believes that it faces this challenging period from a position of relative financial strength and with sufficient liquidity to both navigate the changing environment and seek out new opportunities. The Group closed its financial year on 31 March 2020 with more than US$4 billion in net cash and a US$2.5 billion undrawn revolving credit facility in place. Prosus's bond offering in January 2020 successfully priced US$1.25 billion 3.680% notes (due 2030) to raise proceeds to redeem its US$1.0 billion 6.000% notes that were due in July 2020. The Group has no debt maturities due until 2025.

The Group's largest investment, Tencent, continues to grow off a very large base and in a market, China, which appears to be emerging well from the impact of COVID-19.

• In classifieds, the Group has seen a decline in traffic to its marketplaces. The Group, however, has taken a number of steps to assist customers and partners during this time. In the short-term, the Group expects to experience a negative impact on revenue and profitability in its Classifieds businesses.

• In payments and fintech, the Group's European businesses appear to be resilient. That, however, may change. It remains too early to estimate the impact of the recent lockdown in India on its Payments and Fintech business. India represents more than 50% of its Payments and Fintech business's transaction volume in payments and has initially seen a significant drop in transaction volume. In time, the payments and fintech business is expected to benefit across its markets from large sectoral trends, including more customers transacting online and more online transactions being executed through alternative forms of payment (rather than cash).

• In food delivery, while the Group is experiencing an increased demand for food delivery across its portfolio, it has not always been able to meet that demand due to supply issues as restaurants close. In India, Swiggy is permitted to continue to operate during the lockdown in India. The lockdown in India has, however, not been implemented uniformly across the country and Swiggy's service has been halted in some regions. Swiggy is engaging with the national and regional authorities in India to ensure the uniform implementation of the lockdown. In Brazil, iFood’s efforts to assist its restaurant and food delivery partners has helped mitigate some of the supply issues and, at this stage, order volume is holding up well. In the longer-term, the Group believes that it is likely that the current environment may drive a structural shift in global consumption patterns in favour of food delivery.

• In etail, while eMAG’s main market of operation, Romania, entered a lockdown on 26 March 2020, the business is holding up well at this stage.

All of the Group's businesses have continuity plans in place. The Group is actively assessing potential impacts and supporting its businesses as they take appropriate, market-specific action as needed. The challenges of COVID-19 will vary by sector and geography, but the Group believes it has the teams, the resources and the experience required to navigate them successfully. The Group believes it will emerge from this period well-placed to continue to deliver long-term growth in the markets it serves.

To give further context to the impacts of COVID-19 on the Group's businesses, Prosus invites shareholders to attend a conference call tomorrow, Thursday, 9 April 2020 at 15:00 CET. To access the call please pre-register here. Once registered, participants will be provided with the information needed to join the conference, including the dial-in numbers and a passcode. It is also recommended that participants dial-in 5 to 10 minutes prior to the start time to ensure sufficient opportunity for assistance, should it be required. The recording of the call will be made available on the website, www.prosus.com.

Amsterdam, the Netherlands
8 April 2020

JSE sponsor: Investec Bank Limited

Further information

This announcement contains inside information for the purposes of article 7(1) of the Market Abuse Regulation (596/2014/EU).

Forward-looking statements

This announcement contains certain statements that are, or may be, forward-looking statements. Forward-looking statements are prospective in nature and are not based on current or historical facts, but rather on assumptions, expectations, valuations, targets, estimates, forecasts and projections about future events, and are therefore subject to risks and uncertainties which could cause actual results, performance or events to differ materially from the future results, performance or events expressed or implied by the forward-looking statements. All statements other than statements of historical facts included in this announcement may be forward-looking statements. Without limitation, forward-looking statements often include words such as “targets”, “plans”, “believes”, “hopes”, “continues”, “expects”, “is expected”, “objective”, “outlook”, ”risk”, “seeks”, “aims”, “intends”, “will”, “may”, “should”, “would”, “could”, “anticipates”, “estimates”, “will look to”, “budget”, “strategy”, “would look to”, “scheduled”, “goal”, “prepares”, “forecasts”, “is subject to”, “projects” or words or terms of similar substance or the negative thereof, as well as variations of such words and phrases or statements that certain actions, events or results “may”, “could”, “should”, “would”, “might”, “probably” or “will” be taken, occur or be achieved.

By their nature, forward-looking statements involve risk and uncertainty, because they relate to events and depend on circumstances that will occur in the future and the factors described in the context of such forward-looking statements in this announcement could cause actual results and developments to differ materially from those expressed in, or implied by, such forward-looking statements. Many factors could cause actual results to differ materially from those projected or implied in any forward-looking statements. Due to such uncertainties and risks, readers are cautioned not to place undue reliance on such forward-looking statements, which speak only as of the date of this announcement. Any forward-looking statements made in this announcement on behalf of Prosus are made as of the date of this announcement based on the opinions and estimates of Prosus and no assurance can be given that such opinions or estimates will prove to have been correct.

All forward-looking statements contained in this announcement and all subsequent oral or written forward-looking statements attributable to Prosus or its directors, officers, advisers or employees or any person acting on any of their behalf are expressly qualified in their entirety by the cautionary statements contained or referred to in this section. No person provides any representation, warranty, assurance or guarantee that the occurrence of the events expressed or implied in any forward-looking statements in this announcement will actually occur. Other than in accordance with its legal or regulatory obligations, Prosus is not under, and does not undertake, any obligation, and expressly disclaims any intention or obligation, to update or revise any forward-looking statements, whether as a result of new information, future events or otherwise.

Financial data

None of the information in this announcement has been reviewed by the auditors of Prosus. Figures in this announcement are based on information sourced from the financial statements of the Group as of, and for the financial year ended, 31 March 2020 and the related notes thereto. These figures have not been audited or reviewed, and are subject to adjustment and audit.

No profit forecasts or estimates

No statement in, or referred to in, this announcement is intended as or shall be deemed to be a profit forecast or estimate for any period. No statement in, or referred to in, this announcement or should be interpreted to mean that income of persons (where relevant), cash flow from operations, free cash flow, earnings or earnings per share for Prosus for the current or future financial years would necessarily match or exceed the historic published cash flow from operations, free cash flow, earnings, earnings per share or dividend for Prosus.

Rounding

Certain figures in this announcement, including financial data, have been rounded.

View source version on businesswire.com: https://www.businesswire.com/news/home/20200408005533/en/

Investor Enquiries
Eoin Ryan, Head of Investor Relations
+1 347 210 4305

Media Enquires
Sarah Ryan, International Media Relations
+44 207 251 3801