Singapore's Grab misses quarterly revenue estimates, shares drop

(Reuters) - Grab Holdings missed second-quarter revenue estimates due to slower growth in its mainstay food-delivery business and foreign exchange headwinds, sending its U.S.-listed shares down 5% on Thursday.

Growth has been slowing at the Southeast Asian tech company after the pandemic-era surge in food-delivery demand, with Grab laying off 11% of its workforce last year in a major restructuring aimed at narrowing losses.

Sales from the deliveries business - its largest - grew 11% to $356 million, lower than Visible Alpha estimates of $362.1 million. That compares to growth of 19% in the first quarter, and a doubling of the business in certain quarters of 2023 and 2022.

Ride-share revenue grew a worse-than-expected 14%.

Grab took a hit of more than 500 basis points on both revenue and gross merchandise value as Southeast Asian currencies weakened against the U.S. dollar in the recent past, CFO Peter Oey told Reuters.

"We're very bullish (on the business )... travel has bounced back strongly, especially after the rainy season here," he said.

The company retained its full-year revenue forecast of $2.70 billion to $2.75 billion.

Grab, which competes with Gojek, now part of Indonesia's GoTo Gojek Tokopedia, said in February revenue growth will accelerate in the years beyond 2024 as investments in new products bear fruit.

In the quarter ended June 30, revenue rose 17% to $664 million, missing analysts' estimates of $673.3 million, according to LSEG data.

Adjusted core earnings were $64 million, compared with a loss of $17 million last year. Analysts had expected $62.8 million.

Grab had repurchased about $131 million in company stock as of June-end, part of a $500 million buyback announced in February.

(Reporting by Yuvraj Malik in Bengaluru; Editing by Devika Syamnath)