Anika Begay
About two weeks ago, TechCrunch reported that African e-commerce giant Jumia was planning to sell 20 million American Depository Shares (ADS) and raise more than $100 million, as its stock price was around $5.70 at the time.
The online retailer has now completed the at-the-market transaction offering of 20,227,736 ADSs. Jumia sold the shares at an average price of $4.92 per ADS, generating total gross proceeds before commissions and offering expenses of $99.6 million. TechCrunch reported that Jumia was likely to sell at that price.
Jumia CEO Francis Dufay said in a statement that the capital will “further strengthen our balance sheet and help us accelerate our growth trajectory as we advance along our path to profitability.”
Jumia’s liquidity position currently stands at $92.8 million (including $45.1 million in cash and cash equivalents and $47.7 million in term deposits and other financial assets) as of its Q2 2024, its most recent financial report. This compares to the platform’s liquidity position of $120.6 million in Q4 2023 and $101.5 million in Q1 2024.
Jumia ended the second quarter of the year with 2 million quarterly active customers, representing a 6.0% quarter-on-quarter increase from Q1 2024 and stable year-on-year growth between Q2 2023 and Q2 2024. “Our customer base is still relatively small, around two million active consumers per quarter, while we work in markets with over 600 million people. So we can do much more on the customer base,” Dufay Tthe old TechCrunch before undertaking his first secondary stock sale as CEO earlier this month.
Between 2020 and 2021, when private and public markets were abuzz with capital, the online retailer raised nearly $600 million by selling secondary shares.
