Lojas Renner SA
BOVESPA:LREN3
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Lojas Renner SA
Earnings Call Analysis
Q2-2024 Analysis
Lojas Renner SA
Lojas Renner faced significant weather challenges in the second quarter of 2024, particularly extreme temperatures and severe flooding in key regions of Brazil. Despite these hurdles, the company successfully adapted its business model to maintain profitability. The efforts to consolidate and enhance distribution capabilities resulted in a notable 2.3% increase in gross margin, reflecting improvements in inventory management and a strategic focus on cost efficiency.
This quarter marked the third consecutive period of sales growth for Lojas Renner, spurred by an 8% increase in pieces sold and a 6% rise in transaction volumes, suggesting healthy customer engagement. As adverse weather conditions eased later in the quarter, sales acceleration exceeded initial expectations, indicating robust underlying demand and effective inventory control strategies. By enhancing its distribution center operations, the company was able to achieve pre-transition service levels and improve supply chain responsiveness.
The digital segment displayed promising growth metrics, with the digital sales channel showing stable growth in its overall contribution to total sales. Investments in technology—such as improved app and website functionality—helped optimize logistics and marketing expenses. Lojas Renner anticipates that as inventory systems further integrate and digital platforms evolve, they will enable continued strong growth in this area. In 2024, the company expects ongoing improvement in top-line growth, driven primarily by increased sales volumes rather than price increases.
Lojas Renner initiated a cashback program aimed at building customer loyalty, which has shown early signs of success by increasing purchase frequency and transaction values. The early data indicate that customer satisfaction (NPS) has improved significantly following the introduction of these rewards, reinforcing the effectiveness of the program. The management remains optimistic about leveraging this tool to deepen customer relationships in the future.
The company has maintained strict control over operating expenses, which grew at rates below inflation despite challenges posed by logistics operations. Selling, general, and administrative expenses were successfully reduced compared to net retail revenue, showcasing Lojas Renner’s commitment to operational efficiency. This discipline, coupled with a focused credit strategy yielding a 23% decrease in overdue portfolio losses, underpins the company’s improved financial health and cash flow generation, resulting in a free cash flow of BRL 287 million this quarter.
Looking forward, Lojas Renner forecasts continuing growth in sales volumes and gross margins, driven by operational efficiencies and better inventory management. Investment-driven enhancements to both their digital and physical infrastructure are expected to yield substantial results in the coming quarters. The management's confidence in their growth trajectory is underscored by plans to capture new market opportunities as they expand their store footprint in under-served municipalities across Brazil. They have identified over 90 potential new stores in cities with populations greater than 50,000.
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Good morning, everyone. Let's start the video conference of Lojas Renner S.A. Today here with me Fabio Faccio, CEO; and Daniel Santos, our CFO. Before I give them the floor, I'd like to inform that this video conference is being recorded and translated simultaneously. The presentation will be projected in Portuguese and for those who follow us in English will be made available here by chat and our Investor Relations website.
Questions from journalists should be directed to our press office at 11-3165-9586. And before proceeding, I would like to clarify that forward-looking statements related to the company's business prospect, operating and financial projections and goals cost a mere forecast based on current scenario and does not guarantee performance because it depends on circumstances that may or may not take place. For the Q&A questions, we can have them in audio or text.
And with that, I hand the floor over to Fabio.
Thank you, Carla. Good morning, and thank you all for being here with us today. I'd like to start with the progress we're making in our business model that is driving a new cycle of growth with a focus on increasing profitability and competitiveness. I will comment our performance in the second quarter, this framework. Daniel will then present our detailed financial results before we open to Q&A.
Our preparation in recent years has been quite busy. In addition to the operational adjustments made over the past year, we have invested significantly in recent years to make the company even more customer oriented. The model that we have today is the result of several initiatives focused on product and the customer journey and all through investments in technology, data and AI to create a more agile, flexible and accurate model.
These investments position us to capture opportunities and drive sustainable growth aligned with the following pillars: Being a benchmark in fashion and lifestyle in enchanted experiences, always through strong principles and values of responsible fashion.
Now I'm going to cover the key elements of our business model. First, we enhanced our focus on fashion execution. Through the use of AI, we can now better identify trends and quickly capture customer preferences. We use bots and data analytics to monitor new trends in top sellers, allowing us to anticipate and adjust our product offering to meet consumer needs and preferences.
Today, we are able to identify a trend to develop and produce and test a new product in 20 days. The use of data combined with advanced technology and a shortened design cycle allows us to test and track the success of products in our e-commerce before scaling. We have simplified and digitized our processes, [ supporting ] our product development cycles, and we are integrating this process into our supplier productivity through a management platform. This platform allows us to monitor inventories and supplier productivity.
In addition, our main and more representative partners receive specialized manufacturing price improving the productivity and efficiency of our network. This evolution in time to market has resulted in more efficient inventory management with gross margin growth despite extreme weather events. Another important point is that we have reinforced our commitment to provide enchanted experiences to our customers. We recently completed the largest investment in our history. The distribution center in São Paulo, the most advanced in the fashion segment in Latin America. This distribution center is a key enabler of our 100% SKU sourcing model, allowing for store-to-store item-by-item distribution.
Previously, stores received products impacts, resulting in inventory imbalances that limited sales and margins. Now we benefit from a more granular, agile and accurate AI-enhanced system that optimizes our model. Currently delivery times for stores are in line with pre-transition levels. We have started a sequential evolution cycle that will maximize the potential of the distribution center, allowing for increased sales profitability and inventory turnover. In addition, the distribution center improves the capacity and also it is able to improve the capacity and efficiency of our logistics network, enabling faster supply to stores and improved service to online customers through a synchronized omnichannel operation.
With the migration around us digital operation to the new distribution center we'll have 100% unified inventory, increasing efficiency and taking advantage of the scale of the physical to benefit this operation. This transition will increase available inventory, reduce lead times with the potential to improve the conversion rate and profitability of digital channels. The integration has already been completed for Camicado and Youcom. While Renner is currently in pilot phase for full transition throughout 2025.
We've also advanced our omnichannel journey with significant investments in digital channels to improve service levels and the customer experience. Our brick-and-mortar stores are digitized with employees equipped with mobile devices to access data and make faster decisions as well as improving the customer experience. We implemented RFID technology several years ago and we use from the inventory all the way to sale.
We are the only Brazilian fashion operator to adopt this end-to-end technology, and we can offer several checkout options, traditional cashier, mobile device anywhere in the store, autonomously through Renner's app or at the self-service checkouts that are present in about 60% of our stores. In short, we use technology to better serve our customers. Our circular store model is being replicated in new units and renovations, incorporating sustainability principles for a better customer experience.
This new format increases the visibility of products and integrates with digital channels as we implement and open new stores, we're not only explanting the sales area, but also driving profitability with a faster maturation curve and with greater profitability. Realize is evolving faster than expected, presenting the third consecutive quarter of positive results and with superior portfolio quality.
We have improved our credit and risk management and our value proposition, offering exclusive benefits such as cash back, which has contributed to the loyalty and increase of our retail customer base. The data capture through initiatives like this allows us through AI, more personalized recommendations to customers.
Moving on to the second quarter results. Lojas Renner delivered promising results, especially considering the relevant weather challenges we faced during the first half of the quarter, a period that coincided with the completion of the distribution center consolidation and the increase in lead time, which did not allow us at the time to adjust our product portfolio in an adequate fashion to react to extreme temperature variations. However, it is worth noting that we have reached an important inflection point. Our model is clearly working with results that are benefiting our performance and strengthening our competitive advantage. This enabled the combination of sales growth and profitability achieved in the second half of the quarter.
We saw a reduction in stock outs, decrease lead times and growth in both sales and gross margin with an increase of 2.3% due to lower markdowns due to a collection with the best of fashion trends, competitive one, we're saddled in addition to our improved ability to respond and adapt quickly to challenges that was proven from the second half of the quarter. The performance started at that time and has remained slightly above our expectations. The power of our model has helped mitigate climate challenges. We also benefited from advances in our products and pricing strategies as well as strengthened brand positioning, which contributed to improved NPS in the quarter saw a significant increases in transactions and pieces sold.
Lojas Renner is and an intense cycle of investment, energy adjustments and has started a journey of sequential improvement that is both for sales and profitability, with the aim of strengthening its position as the largest and best fashion company in Latin America. We are satisfied with the moment we're living in the results we have obtained. Each of the initiatives mentioned serve as evidence or plan in action.
Before Daniel comment on the results, I'd like to thank our team, our members of the Board, all our partners for their hard work and dedication as we continue to execute and leverage the potential of Lojas Renner. We know we have much more to be done and we're confident with the opportunities to continue to serve our millions of customers as well as our shareholders with growing value [ rate ].
Now I pass the floor to Daniel, who will bring a more detailed view of the numbers.
Thank you, Fabio. Good morning, everyone. Thank you for participating in our second quarter earnings video conference of 2024. As Fabio described despite the considerable weather challenges during the quarter, our business model allowed for solid profitability. We delivered an increase of 2.3% in gross margin, which is sequentially advancing towards pre-pandemic levels. In addition, we remain focused on the discipline of expense and inventory management. Expenses of the second quarter of 2024 were below inflation, while we had robust cash flow generation. Realize also showed improvements in results, a clear indication that we have turned the page. These are significant examples of the evolution of our company.
We will now analyze in detail and starting with the composition of sales. We reached growth, and this is the third consecutive quarter of sales leveraged by an increase in pieces that is 8% and an increase in transaction of 6%. Even with the weather extremes faced in the first half of the quarter. As described by Fabio, we had extreme hot temperatures in the south of Brazil, specifically in the Southeast, the severe floods in the state of Rio Grande do Sul where we have a relevant market share which impacted the sales for 2 consecutive.
We're pleased with the completion of the final phase of stabilization of our supply model for Q2. However, as we were still in the process of adjusting and consolidation of our distribution center in São Paulo. Specifically in the first half, we operated with longer lead time to serve our stores. And this limitation impacted our logistic capacity with just assortment in stores to react to high temperatures.
However, during the second half of the quarter, we saw temperatures get down to normal and we observed an acceleration in the levels of sales in line with our expectations as we had the semester follow. So we have that acceleration so much above our expectation and the sales trend has been maintained so far. We also have our distribution center in São Paulo at full operation, operating at pre-transition service levels and in a cycle of sequential efficiency and productivity improvements with reduced stock out and shorter lead times.
Now getting to our business, the digital channel showed GMV growth with a more stable share in total sales and with optimization of investments in media, and the management of logistics expense and also allowed efficiency levels similar to those of our brick and mortar stores.
Camicado grew above its segments with better productivity in stores, driven by the increase in the number of transactions and also items per bag. The digital channel also performed well with new versions of the app and website. Youcom showed relevant growth in sales, given the greater flexibility of the collection with lighter and mid-season products, which was also a reflection of Valentine's Day, which is the major commercial event for the brand in the quarter.
This way, we had another quarter with evolution of our active customer base of the ecosystem, which reached nearly 19 million customers but growth was driven by adjustments to our price and fashion pyramid value equation as well as improved NPS across all business and channels.
Our investments to raise service levels and improve the customer journey experience have positively impacted results. And in terms of gross margin, as mentioned earlier, the strong gross margin expansion was important highlight of the quarter and a significant indicator that our business model is already generating value through better inventory management.
We developed a more versatile winter collection and the great agility of our model allowed us to develop, produce and distribute faster, which, combined with greater integration with our supplier network, enable the quick reaction to sales trends. We started the quarter with a 10% reduction in inventory which combined with the assertiveness, flexibility of the collection and greater supply chain activity mitigated the need for largest sock markdowns. And that resulted in a 2.3% expansion in gross margin in line with our goal of maintaining a healthy inventory to sales ratio without the need to carry inventory that would require future liquidity -- sales now in the third quarter.
Expenses grew less than inflation in the period in line with our commitment for the year even with the additional expenses related to logistics stabilization. Such results reinforce our commitment to controlling expenses aligning the investment necessary for the evolution of our business with operational efficiency gain. It's important to highlight that we reduced selling, general and administrative expenses in relation to net retail revenue despite the challenging sales scenario in the second quarter. As mentioned, the new supply model and the distribution center have entered a phase of efficiency and productivity gains, which will be reflected in our results.
However, as our business model gains more traction, we expect continued operating leverage in the ratio of expenses to revenues. Results of Realize continues to strengthen its relevance within the ecosystem, presenting a third consecutive quarter of positive results. That way we ended the cycle of adjustments in the portfolio and moved for the consistent recovery trajectory. We evolved our credit management, allowing us to make the supply of credit more flexible in the progressive and selective manner that was since March. And at the same time, we're introducing new features and loyalty benefit such as cash back, which was rolled out at the end of May. That way, the share of cards increased 1.8% year-over-year.
And June was the first month after several quarters in which we saw an increase in retail sales through Renner Card. Cashback has also contributed to an increase in the customer base and greater frequency of purchase. A drop in the portfolio reflected a 23% decrease in the overdue portfolio as a result of the credit restriction actions implemented since mid-2022 to improve credit quality as well as greater collection efficiency of the portfolio. Quarter's revenues decreased, reflecting the improvement in the portfolio's credit risk profile. However, net loss showed a strong reduction. As a result of the measures adopted in the concession, maintenance and collection that improved the risk profile of the portfolio, resulting in a lower need for loss provisions.
In this quarter, Realize also had made an assignment of credit from a written of portfolio overdue over 360 days in the amount of BRL 115.8 million. During the quarter, we further strengthened the KPIs of our portfolio. We are focused on improving our credit models also through an improvement of credit offer, developing better risk assessment models, which allowed us with a more sophisticated one to approve more customers with better credit profile. We had a [ important ] reduction of 3.2% in overdue loans over 90 days year-over-year and 9% sequentially compared to the first quarter of 2024, mainly due to the lower formation of overdue balance above 90 days.
The total coverage of the portfolio reached 17.4%, a 2.4% lower year-over-year. However, the overnight coverage increased from 95.3% to 99.3% year-over-year. The adjusted EBITDA increased 39% year-over-year due to improved performance in the retail and credit segment reflected in a margin increase of 5.7%, which combined with the reduction of CapEx during the quarter, resulted in a free cash flow of BRL 287 million for the period.
Also, when we talk about net income, it also increased 37%, another reflection that successfully has impact on our results. Too close, we are pleased to deliver encouraging results during the second quarter, demonstrated through improved volume trends, gross margin expansion, expense diligence adjusted inventories and strong balance sheet.
Despite extreme weather events during the quarter, the execution of our business model, adapting and reacting quickly to external variables integrated with the supplier network with better time to market and responsiveness allowed a very healthy margin and a 3% reduction of inventories at the end of the quarter.
The financial and operational discipline developed so far and that we will continue to pursue has allowed us to focus on increasing profitability and generating value for our shareholders. We started the third quarter in a consistent manner with healthy inventory levels will follow evolving with our time to market for the second half of the year with additional improvements in our distribution center, anticipating trends faster and reacting with agility.
With that, I'd like to give the floor back to Fabio for his final remarks before we move on to Q&A.
Thank you, Daniel. In recent quarters, we have completed the cycle of investment in transformation that are enabling Renner to become increasingly competitive and better positioned for a new growth cycle. We are now beginning to reap investments, which should intensify even more from now on. For the second half, we expect the continuation of volume-driven sales dynamics as a result of the result of important adjustments made. We also expect continued evolution in gross margin. Thanks to the models increased agility and responsibility.
Regarding operating leverage, our operations are more streamlined and optimized, in line with our commitment to efficiency gains, productivity and also diluting expenses throughout the year. For Realize, we are confident in the continuity of positive dynamics of the first semester combined with a more refined credit and risk management contributing to the continued strengthening of retail performance.
We reached an important inflection point during the second quarter, which reinforces our conviction that this model is leading us into a new cycle of growth and profitability. That way, in 2024, we expect a normal price growth with a focus on profitability and competitiveness in line with the year in which the benefits of investments made in recent years start to be reaped. We know that the scenario still brings challenges. However, we are well positioned to continue capturing opportunities enchanting customers gaining market share, generating value to our shareholders, employees and consumers becoming increasingly more a benchmark in fashion lifestyle, enchanting experiences, responsible fashion and building exceptional results.
Thank you and I pass the floor back to Carla.
[Operator Instructions]
And the first question comes from Luiz Guanais from BTG.
Two questions here on my side. First, if you could talk a bit about the volume evolution over the quarters in the markdown level from Q2 to Q3 and a second question about the distribution center. I know that the ramp-up still brought some inefficiency in the quarter -- in the semester, as you mentioned, but I'd like to know what is the expectation to capture efficiency from now on for the second semester, but also looking into 2025?
Thank you, Guanais. Well, yes, the evolution of volume and markdown over the quarter, really matches what we've said. There are 2 different stores here in the first half of the semester where it was really a challenge, a big challenge because of temperature where we have stores more in cold regions. We have Argentina, Rio Grande do Sul also Santa Catarina, where we have a greater proportion of stores compared to others so this was definitely a greater challenge.
And at the same time, we had the flood in Rio Grande do Sul and that's a relevant participation -- was -- and we were to complete the consolidation of the distribution center was operating, but not with the reaction capacity that we can have now that could have mitigated much, and we could reposition our inventory quickly and with former weather we could have lighter leases.
But since we were about to complete our consolidation, we could not react accordingly. So we say that the reduction of volume of the first semester was more challenging. However, from this second quarter on or as Carla corrected me, from half of the second semester on the variation continued, but not as drastic, the flood was there, but the flow was back to where we had -- where we could get our stores back to being open, and we were able to complete the consolidation of the distribution center. This is something that completes our model to capture trends, develop collection, optimize production and the distribution through our distribution center.
And now it is leveraging our process were from SKU to SKU, we can get the same level of services we had with the packs before and that is just the beginning. So at the second half of the quarter, we could already see quite an improvement. And from now on, it will help much more. So the second volume for the second half of the quarter was much higher than the first and the markdown we already were more lean with the inventory because the level of development is really quick where we can capture, develop, produce and have it ready for sale right away. So we can work in lean inventory and produce during the collection when we realized that the performance of the first part was under what we had.
We could organize our inventories, so we can still have a lean inventory, and we could have a positive margin that way. So I would say that the margin gain comes from the reduction of the older inventory, we completed the quarter with 3% drop of the general inventory, but of the older inventory was much greater. I don't need to get into numbers here, but I can say it was much greater. So we have a lean new inventory and that allowed us to have a 2.3% growth in gross margin and a reduction and in price. We have more competitiveness with appealing price for our customers' new products, lean inventory, and we have a new collection and with no problem for markup.
So the dynamic of the volume for the second quarter or half of the second quarter, much better than what we have in the first part of the second quarter and margin growth also, no need of greater markup from now on, great performance of the collection and the speed of development of the collection is at an optimum level. And with the distribution center operating much better and speed. So as we said a year ago that we expected that for the second semester for this year, and actually, we had that take place 15 days before or 45 days before, I would say. So it was half second quarter of this year from half second quarter this year, the model has been working quite well, became a bit before what we had expected and a bit over what we had expected as well.
So I believe that really answers in terms of when we talk about the efficiency of the distribution center, that is something from the past.
The next question is from Ruben Couto from Santander.
I want to hear a bit about the distribution center. You had said in the past about the potential of gain of productivity for mature stores because I believe there was a percentage that was under the average and the distribution center could contribute to have a normalization in the level of productivity and margin that could be better. So could you tell us what is your perception when it comes to that? And if you see there is some absorption there and how the distribution center now that is consolidated could contribute to this evolution to get to a mature store and a greater margin?
Sure. Ruben, thank you for the question. I would say that it's important to say that distribution center is a part of a model. The model is much bigger than the distribution center. Alone you won't do anything, but it enables much. So what we're very happy with and very confident from now on is that we have the model that was planned, thought through developed strong investment in the last few years and now is up and running, already generating value from the half of the second quarter, and it will carry on with the capacity even a bit over what we had expected.
The model translate into being able to capture the best trends quickly, develop products quickly and be able to get to the distribution center quickly and in a granular fashion distribute piece by piece, store-to-store quickly also to our online customers. So I would say that the capacity where we have a level of service similar to what we had in the past when it was made by pack and now it's 100% by SKU. I don't know many companies around the world that are able to do that because it will take longer and it's more expensive. We're already at the same level and with much opportunity of reducing the time and also expenses, and that's something that we will have sequentially coming through.
So the productivity of the model will increase, that's the trend. In terms of the gains that reflect on sales and margin and profitability because of the productivity, we expect to have an increased gain, a gradual one for both mature stores and [indiscernible] smaller stores that is most of our expansion plan because we have the mature stores with opportunities where there were inefficiency when you send a full pack of product that sometimes they just needed half or 70% of the pack or 130%, and you would spend or 200 or just 100. So you broaden your capacity of sales with less inventory where you distribute better than inventory among stores increased sales, you reduce stock out to increase turnover.
So yes, increased sales of mature stores whereby square meter. We have a consistent sales and it's hard to grow when you already have it. And now you're able to because granularly you're able to have that response and even the other ones where you don't have a lot of assortment offer and when we can, in a granular fashion have smaller pack store by store, we brought in the assortment of the customers for the smaller stores, and our expansion plan is of smaller stores and smaller cities. So depending on the store that can increase in a significant, relevant manner, the potential. That is for both mature and smaller stores.
Next question from Thiago Macruz, Itau BBA.
Okay. Fabio, we've seen, especially with this result that the major driver was inefficiency. Gross margin, where you were able to see a number more than the market had expected because of these reasons. From the top line, we haven't seen a substantial acceleration but in your speech, I realize in this call and the last one, the expectation that everything that you've been doing will bring a new cycle of growth. We don't have the same number of stores opening we had in the past. So the new stores are less relevant than what we had in the past. Is it reasonable to say that you expect a strong acceleration in top line for the next year? Is that what you expect is what the company expects. Is that we should take home? That's my question.
Thank you for your question Macruz. Well we have our expectation and also it depends on many variables. So it's hard to affirm what will be the future, but we do have an expectation of an improvement of top line and we already have that. As we tried to give this view where the quarter has 2 different stores. The first part was quite challenging, and the second was very good and the second half until now until this moment, where we're at the beginning of the third quarter.
And what do we mean by that? When we look into the number or top line of the quarter, it reflects both stories. But the first one is different from the second where we see and I apologize for the joke. You have your mind in the urban and your foot in the fridge, your body temperature would be different. So it's pretty much what we have there. So it's not only about the expectation. But I think the top line has shown to be very important slightly over our previous expectations and that comes throughout the beginning of this quarter.
And what we will see from now on is one that we expect to keep the pace in line with our expectation or slightly over our expectations. And that's what we have been seeing. And this is different from what we see in the quarter in terms of the first part. So this is very clear.
And also Macruz, you talked about the expansion cycle. One point that we see now in your question allows us address an important point in terms of our expansion plan that, yes, in the past, we had a growth that was strong because of increase of store floor in our current expansion plan proportionally. You don't have that same expansion of store floor as we had in the past. But the dynamic is different from what we have of a compound growth.
The part we have addressed here and the model will allow us to have growth at the same store as the current ones with efficiency growth, which is valuing of our assets, something that comes from same-store sales than what we had in the past, which is very positive for the profitability of the business, generating more value to the current assets.
And on the other hand, we have the online growing greatly that we did not have back then, and it generates an important growth. And the third line of expansion for growth which are the new stores as much as the full square meters of what we have, it's not as relevant as we had in the past. It's healthier. What do I mean? We are getting into new markets in markets we had not been before.
So most are coming to new markets so this generate an acceleration when it comes to sales, it's higher because one thing is going to a mall where there were no flow competing with others and cannibalizing sales from others and the other is going to a consolidated market with much flow in the best location in the city where you start at a higher level.
We had a very positive experience in the 84 stores that we have in the cities under 200,000 inhabitants. We already have 84 stores from [indiscernible] Inhabitants over average were 24 we opened in 2021. In our expansion plan, we have at least 107 stores for the next years that is for Renner where 90 in new cities. But we should remember that municipalities in Brazil, over 50,000 inhabitants. We have 682 cities, 90, we have already mapped and we're building or negotiating locations or looking for the best places. So there are 682, not 90.
This marginal growth that doesn't come from these will be really great for profitability. I forgot to mention also the 682 municipalities were present in 219 cities of the municipalities in Brazil, over 50,000 habitants. 219 were already present. So 32% of them. The other 68% are opportunity for us, 90, we're already working on.
Next, company from João Soares for Citi.
Fabio and Daniel, congratulations for your results. Well, I believe I want to focus on the outlook into the future, you talked about tailwinds. I want to understand 2 points. What about the role of the financial institution? We know that credit was an issue in the performance. So I want to understand a bit more about the role. You talked about the distribution center. I want to understand more about Realize.
And also Fabio with the fee of cross-border brings more in terms of the discipline. I want to understand more of your view on that. And I apologize, there's a third point about -- looking ahead, I mean when we talk about the role of distribution center, it's better in the gross margin but also in the pressure of cost from here on.
I want to know about the heads of what you have seen in terms of the pressure.
Thank you , João. I would start with the cross border, talk about the main points here. For the cross border, everybody has been seeing what we have. There was a dynamic which wasn't a very fair, the national company is paying, on average 109% of tax, while the cross border we're paying 0. So that was the first step from August 1 and on. The cross border companies are adding the federal state taxes is 44.6% now, where we pay on average 98% weighted in. So I would say it's still not fair. It's not the right way to go, but it's a step forward from 0 to 44.6%, changes the competitive dynamics.
I believe that everyone should work so we can have that. So if it's 44.6%, it should be for everyone. I won't mind to go down. But if it's not, should not for anyone. So I think -- I see that this is one of the main points. I mean everybody is working on that unions. But if we compare to what we had until August 1, we have a different dynamics now. And this is another tailwind favorable to the segment where we are able to gain with that to the country, Brazilian.
About the financial institution, that's another tailwind. There is an important role to retail where we were able because we had a very challenging cycle since Paula came in and with our team, we have a different dynamics where we qualified our team not only with Paula that has been doing great work, but she kept our best for bringing new talent with great tool enhancement, and the whole scenario has improved. So our internal work with a macro improvement has allowed us not only to have a positive results at Realize.
But even more Realize can get back to leveraging retail in a responsive manner which result in Realize and retail because to give credit in a responsible way does not, add value in a responsive way it does both to customers, to Realize and to the retail of our group. And we have seen great actions and loyalty of clients. There is the credit aspect, but there are also benefits in loyalty that is a win-win situation for customers that have been praising the process and to us. We have been able to leverage our sales at a lower cost with results with Realize and greater knowledge of our clients to be able to offer a better journey.
And I'll leave Daniel to talk a bit more about the results.
Just to conclude, 2 [indiscernible]. First, we have a selective and open way for credit were models that are smarter, more sophisticated something that we have been doing since end of March and this focuses more on the possibility of the concession. And also one point that is important where we always have the question in terms of the size of the portfolio. Our concern and our main focus is how can we bring in a greater database for clients. So through private label necessarily, you're not going to have an increase on your portfolio. The idea is to be able to have them come on board in a gradual selective manner and increasing the database and recovering the customers we lost in the past because of the credit situation.
When it comes to effect before the year of 2024, the impact is one that has to do with our position and much of that what you buy at the end of the year, end up bringing inventory and you'll sell in 2025. Definitely, the foreign exchange that is higher will bring impact in 2025. We need to understand what will be the strategy. This is something we'll be soon discussing in our discussion that will soon take place.
Next from Vinicius Strano from UBS.
Back to Realize, if you could give more detail about the change in the credit score that you have in presenting and how we can see the evolution of delinquency in terms of sequential reduction. I'd like to understand a bit more of what you see from now on and also operating expense so we can understand a bit more of Realize's result and the participation of Renner's card, we're talking about 30%. So I want to understand a bit more how you see this in terms of credit origination for the second quarter -- or second semester, excuse me.
Thank you, Vinicius. In terms of the credit model, it's what I said since Paula came, she assessed the model, and she brought a greater sophistication to the model. We realized that at certain point, we were being too strict when it came to some criteria. So Paula with a new people with us have sophisticated the model. So this model allows us to evolve gradually selectively without having put aside the credit risk because we know that the environment of credit risk in Brazil is not an easy when they're still challenged.
So for operating expense, you would have seen that for the code of the year, there was a specific amount where Paula where the team have been very assertive and be very efficient to understand where we should have the greater expense and to control expenses still true for Realize over the year for card share. And I go back to what I said before. There was an improvement in our participation in why because on one hand, you have more concessions, as I mentioned, where you bring and accelerate your level of concession. This really helps the participation and the differentiation of the product.
When we got to cash back, we have 2 impacts. First, those that have the card and end up using cards of third-party -- of others, I mean they can commit because they will have a benefit of buying something the next time. And for those who do not have the card and might not be an issue of credit, but they are more willing to order a card because they know they'll get some benefits. So the combination of these 2 things will allow us to evolve in a positive manner in terms of penetration.
So we believe in this potential of evolving the penetration of the card quarter-over-quarter, and that's what we've been seeing because other than cash back, Paula and our team and our marketing team are thinking of other possibility of products to improve the keel of the Renner card. And I should also add to your question, Vinicius, Daniel just said about the rollout of cash back Since then, we have had a record in participation during this quarter for card.
It's a gradual slight increase. It's not exponential, but the share has been increasing. The levels of participation has been increasing. And another important aspect is the credit model. It has improved the assessment, but also implemented our credit model with a greater number of variables in the concession that Daniel said, where it was focused on us and also to get to know customers better and evolving more but with a greater variable option.
Next question is Andrew Ruben from Morgan Stanley.
I was hoping you could focus a bit on the digital operations. We've seen the penetration flatlining a bit. I'm curious your perspective on where you think e-commerce penetration can go or how you're thinking about the relative balance of driving digital versus the rest of the business?
For those who are listening to us in Portuguese, he asked about digital that had a more stabilized penetration now for the second quarter, what is the expectation from now on and what are the drivers of this increase?
Thank you, Andrew, for your question. The digital has an important opportunity of increasing participation penetration where we see an increase in participation has been growing and face much on the fact that we were able, with all the investment, one of the things that allow us to be confident today, we have a digital with profitability, very similar to our brick-and-mortar stores. So we can have scalability, and it won't be negative. So what I'm saying is that with the trend of the new features on the digital, we're able to even have a -- what we're talking about.
One of the main points is that we still have a relevant opportunity in the digital with a migration of our online distribution center which is still in Rio, operating from Rio. It will migrate in 2025, to Cabreúva, Camicado and newcomers already there.
Renner, we're doing both Cabreúva and Rio de Janeiro, once we have them both the operation that is online all in the same place, online will have 100% of the full inventory of the company available and that is a huge assortment option to customers, and this allows to have an increase in conversion rate, more inventory, more assortment, less stock out and an optimum level of lead time and being able to also get it right with a brick and mortar in terms of delivering and also in terms of delivery cost. So the penetration itself must increase. We are still investing on usability of our website, of our apps, and this brings a greater conversion, but mainly from 2025 on the likelihood is having greater tools to take more steps forward in the digital, and it will increase throughout this year, but all the way to 2025.
The next question is from Joseph Giordano from JPMorgan.
You talked a lot about growth. I'd like to understand to what extent this new tool will leverage more sales. We see in the second quarter with the gross margin, a bit of a churn in the beginning. So I want to understand a bit of your thinking when it comes to the outlook, the macro environments are better and the credit you're working on and how can you reinvest on this gain to improve and get back to the benchmark compared to local competitors, international ones because we're talking about the balance of the gross margin?
Thank you, Joseph, for the question. I would say there are many tailwinds. You talked about the macro improving the segment improving, which is very positive. The omni players in Brazil are getting better. So the whole sector and the omni proposal is much more consistent than just physical or digital so the tailwind for the fashion industry shows a gradual improvement and macro scenario will help the credit of Realize also because we are in a better position with more tools and a better macro scenario and the economy we can have maybe the interest rate better as well, but this can help everyone and for us what's most intense is because we have a new model up and running.
And the new model has proven in the first half of the quarter with all the challenges we had where we were able to mitigate, and we were able to show that even during hard times, it can work and there wasn't 100% up and running. And the second part of the quarter till now, we see that in a regular situation, it will work really well. And we see that it will bring healthy growth of sales and with healthy growth, growth of margin and also of turnover. So we don't need to focus on one only. So it's a cycle growth with efficiency cycle and profitability growth. So that's what we expect from the model. And that's why we've invested so much. It was hard work.
It hurt us for a bit for a short time, but now it's up and running. And our confidence expectation is that it will be better month over month in terms of sales margin and market share gain. That's what we expect. It will be better for us than for the market as a whole.
The next question is from Irma Sgarz from Goldman Sachs.
I wanted to know a bit about the performance of Youcom. It has been quite solid and the collection was very assertive so I don't know if there's any read across learning from this moment. I know that the brand has been around for some time now but it's younger than Renner when you talk about the collections. I'm talking more about the process of the collection, building the collection. I want to know a bit more about the climate change and the volatility that is important, not only the logistics capacity to react but also to build a collection with versatility.
And the second question, most of my questions here were already made, I guess, I just have this question.
Irma, I would say that it's a young brand, it's been some time with us and it has been growing. And yes, it has less years of operation than Renner. Renner is growing, but Youcom have younger customer, but for Renner, we have been increasing more with the young customers. So it's a bit of the market itself. The young fashion market has improved with also when we talk about Renner and Youcom, Ashua also. So we -- Ashua, Youcom and Renner, we have the share of benchmarking these practices among them all from Renner to Youcom, Youcom to Renner. So we do use much of that. The difference in terms of the quarter is that there's a point where the main date for Renner was Mother's Day.
There was the first half of the quarter. And it was at the peak of the floods of the state of Rio Grande do Sul and with the temperatures were quite high and without the condition of bringing the best product to the store. So it wasn't a great Mother's Day. And for Youcom, Mother's Day is not a big date. It's Valentine's Day. And Valentine's Day was on the second half of the quarter where we were doing really well for Renner and Youcom sales. So then you get greater leverage through Valentine's Day, and that is a bit of the difference we have there.
And another point which Youcom's growth is because same-store sales, which was relevant, but also you know that the average was more for Youcom than Renner.
I'd add now a second question and talking about the performance, when you talked about adjusting the architecture, you talked about the increase of the growth that needs to be -- will be positive in the second part of the year. So when we talk about an average price for the collection, is it fair to say that maybe we will not have this as a great contribution or sales increase, it will be more a matter of volume. Would that be fair to say?
I would say that for now, the growth will come more from volume, the average prices a bit less, more competitive. It will grow with price, but the average price reduce with greater margin and less markup, which is important to emphasize. And there's the dynamics for the next year that we know that we have been thinking of because of the foreign exchange, which is not very stable, quite unstable. So we will keep our competitiveness, but we need to know how that will work and how the market will work.
But what's important is for us to always really keep up the competitiveness in the market. We are having the best value and margins. I believe we have a good model for that, and we are able by quick capturing, quick development, quick production, quick distribution to quickly adapt to any drastic change in our scenario.
The next question comes from Melissa Byun, Bank of America.
Congratulations on the progress. I wanted to follow up on the cashback program. What are the initial impacts that you're seeing in terms of purchase recurrence, average ticket and NPS. And how should we think about any incremental cost?
The question is related to cash back. What are the first signs we see in terms of recurrence and average ticket also cost related to that.
Well, Melissa, thank you for your question. I believe we are at the initial stages. We recently started. We had our projections for the model and all indicators that you ask, I can say we're better than what we had expected. So we try to improve NPS, recurrence with a cost of the margin. NPS has increased more, recurrence as well and the ticket as well and the margin cost is less than what we had expected.
Next question is from Danny Eiger from XP.
I have a quick one and a follow-up on the profit that was the discussion you brought just to understand this level where Fabio said was a lot because of reducing old inventory. You've had headwinds in half of the quarter, but we have the seasonality of sales with a new collection coming in. So my question is to understand that if this level is one that we can see that is sustainable for the next quarters because of the seasonality, and we can have this leverage of the distribution center as the mitigator as you have the challenges in this quarter. So we -- I want to understand in terms of normalized margin level.
Thank you for your question, Danny. I would say we don't have any inventory issue from markup. We are really healthy with inventory in terms of volume in ratings. So we can say, obviously, you can't affirm, but we believe we have a potential to sustain our margin at the best levels ever. So before we even thought that we could carry on with the best levels and I believe with the new model, we can trust that working well. We can even exceed the best levels that we've had.
And maybe to complement, I think the second quarter has also this main point, but we have the expectation of an advance -- a positive advance of the gross margin as we had before when we talked about the ambitions for 2024, which is a recovery of gross margin that we would have throughout the year with some seasonality where we were able, for instance, to have much success in all these aspects that Fabio mentioned, and you pointed out, but there's potential to keep evolving for the next quarters and as Fabio mentioned and you pointed our but there is potential to keep evolving for the next quarters and as Fabio mentions to follow up with all our capabilities to pursue levels before the pandemic.
Because of be at the top of the hour, we'll just open now to [indiscernible].
I just have a quick question. I just want to understand the whole dynamics of portfolio over 360 days. Some time ago, you had said that it made sense for the portfolio and sometimes it was not worth having that collected in-house and Paula has a strategy now to have this strategy to be more simplified.
Thank you, Pedro. Thank you for the question. Actually, we are always looking into opportunity. So we do not have a said and done rule to follow. Paula and the team is always evaluating. There was an opportunity of a delinquent portfolio that we could sell and it made sense, and we were able to do it now for the second quarter. So we will keep checking, and we will always see what makes sense to us. And if it's the case, we might carry that out again.
With that, we close the Q&A and I pass the floor back to Fabio for your final comment.
Thank you. Thank you, everyone, for your time. I'd just like to say that we worked strongly to be where we're at now. It was a long cycle of investment of intense work and we have been now on a cycle of reaping and growing, increased investment, profitability. So we are confident in the model that we have evolved and we will work intensely to bring value to our customers, employees, shareholders and partners. Thank you, everyone.
Thank you. Thank you, everyone. Bye-bye.
[Statements in English on this transcript were spoken by an interpreter present on the live call.]