ASOS Regulatory News (ASC)

18 March 2014

ASOS plc ("the Company")

Global Online Fashion Destination

Trading Statement for the two months ended 28 February 2014

* Includes retail sales, delivery receipts and third party revenues.

Two months to 28 February 2014 highlights

· Retail sales +26% year on year (UK +21%, International +29%)

· International retail sales 65% of total (63% last year)

· Retail gross margin down c.30bps on prior year

Six months to 28 February 2014 highlights

· Retail sales +34% year on year (UK +32%, International +35%)

· International retail sales 61% of total (61% last year)

· Retail gross margin up c.60bps on prior year

· 8.2 million active customers* at 28 February 2014 (+36% year on year)

· Strong balance sheet and cash position

*Defined as having shopped in the last 12 months

Nick Robertson, CEO, commented:

"The Group delivered strong sales and margin growth over the first six months of the year (+34% and +60bps respectively) and we are now confident of achieving £1bn of sales in FY 2013/14. We ended the period with 8.2 million active customers, a 36% increase year on year.

Retail sales for the two months to February were strong in all territories except Rest of World where we experienced adverse currency movements, notably in Australia and Russia.

We have accelerated our investment in warehousing (both in the UK and Germany) and in IT, so that we will invest at least £68m in capital expenditure in the current year (previous guidance £55m.) This investment will increase our sales capacity to c£2.5bn per annum, over £1bn higher than previous guidance. Our investment in warehousing necessitated levels of dual running costs over the period which will ease from H2 2014/15.

This investment, as well as the investment in our China start-up, will reduce our EBIT margin for the current financial year to 31 August 2014 to c.6.5%. This year these costs will be disproportionately borne in H1, resulting in a likely H1/H2 Profit before Tax split of approximately 30%/70%.

It has been an exceptionally busy period of activity at ASOS, with continued growth and accelerated investment, as we continue to build "The Number 1 Online Fashion Destination for 20 Somethings Globally." 

Analyst/Investor conference call:

ASOS will be hosting a conference call for analysts and investors at 8:30am (UK Time) today. Please call Jamie Ramsay at Instinctif Partners for dial-in details on 020 7457 2047 or email jamie.ramsay@instinctif.com.

A recording of this conference call will be available on the ASOS Plc investor centre website later today: http://www.asosplc.com/investors.aspx 

Photography:

Latest photography will be available at: http://www.asosplc.com/media/image-library.aspx

For further information:

Background note

ASOS is a global fashion destination for 20-somethings. We sell cutting-edge 'fast fashion' and offer a wide variety of fashion-related content, making ASOS.com the hub of a thriving fashion community. We sell over 75,000 branded and own-brand products through localised mobile and web experiences, delivering from our UK hub to almost every country in the world.

We tailor the mix of own-label, global and local brands sold through each of our nine local language websites: UK, US, France, Germany, Spain, Italy, Australia, Russia and China.

ASOS's websites attract 71 million visits per month (February 2013: 52 million) and as at 28 February 2014 had 8.2 million active customers1 (28 February 2013: 6.0 million), of which 3.2 million were located in the UK and 5.0 million were located in our international territories (28 February 2013: 2.5 million in the UK and 3.5 million internationally).

1 Defined as having shopped in the last 12 months

Appendix 1

Retail sales by quarter for the year ending 31 August 2014

Retail sales by quarter for the year ending 31 August 2013

Retail sales by quarter for the year ending 31 August 2012

1Four months to 31 December

2 Two months to 28 February