• Total payment volume through MercadoPago surpassed the $5.5 billion mark for the first time, reaching $5.6 billion, a year-over-year increase of 35.1% in USD and 82.5% on an FX neutral basis. Total payment transactions increased 93.7% year-over-year, totaling 143.9 million transactions for the quarter.
• MercadoPago experienced continued success in execution of off-platform payments (online and offline) through merchant services, mobile point-of-sale ("MPOS") devices, and the mobile wallet business. On a consolidated basis, off-platform total payment volume grew 118.8% year-over-year in USD and 194.2% on an FX neutral basis.
• For the first time ever, off-platform payments processed over $2.5 billion in transactions, surpassing 80 million payment transactions in a single quarter with 88.2 million payment transactions.
• MPOS business is still one of the fastest growing non-marketplace business units, representing 43.9% of total off-platform payment volume for the quarter. On a consolidated basis, MPOS total payment volume grew 260.4% year-over-year on an FX neutral basis.
• Our mobile wallet again reached four times the number of active payers during the quarter as compared to the same period in 2018, and total payment volume from mobile wallet in Argentina, Brazil and Mexico continued to reflect triple digits growth year-over-year.
• Our asset management product, Mercado Fondo, is now available in Argentina and Brazil, where we offer our entire suite of FinTech solutions: MPOS devices, QR code in-store payments, mobile wallet and asset management.
• Gross merchandise volume ("GMV") reaccelerated surpassing the $3 billion mark, reaching $3.1 billion, a 1.7% year-over-year decrease in USD, and a 26.6% year-over-year increase on an FX neutral basis, following a decrease of 10.6% in USD and growth of 17.6% on an FX neutral basis in the fourth quarter of 2018.
• Items sold reached 82.8 million, growing 3.3% year-over-year, compared to a growth of 50.8% in the first quarter of 2018. The decline in the year-over-year growth rate is attributable to Brazil, where in July of last year we launched the R$5 flat listing fee on items below R$ 120 and removed listings below R$ 6 as we shift towards incentivizing buyers to purchase higher-ticket items.
• Unique buyers also reaccelerated increasing 10.8% year-over-year versus 7.5% during the fourth quarter of 2018.
• Live listings offered on MercadoLibre's marketplace surpassed for the first time the 200 million mark reaching 200.6 million in the first quarter of 2019, a 57.9% year-over-year increase.
• Mobile gross merchandise volume grew 10.9% year-over-year on an FX neutral basis reaching 62.9% of GMV.
• Items shipped through MercadoEnvios reached 62.9 million, an 18.6% year-over-year increase, driven primarily by the expansion of our free shipping program. The number of items shipped in Argentina, Mexico, Chile and Colombia were highlights of the quarter, growing 110.8%, 74.9%, 29.8% and 44.0%, respectively, year-over-year.

• Net revenues for the first quarter grew to $473.8 million, a year-over-year increase of 47.6% in USD and 92.9% on an FX neutral basis.
• Enhanced marketplace revenues increased 79.8% year-over-year in USD, and increased 128.4% on an FX neutral basis, while non-marketplace revenues increased 22.4% year-over-year in USD and 65.2% on an FX neutral basis.
• Gross profit was $237.0 million with a margin of 50.0%, compared to 50.7% in the first quarter of 2018. Most of the gross margin compression is attributable to shipping carrier and operating costs.
• Total operating expenses were $226.9 million, an increase of 18.1% year-over-year in USD. As a percentage of revenues, operating expenses were 47.9%, as compared to 59.9% during the first quarter of 2018.
• Income from operations was $10.1 million, as compared to a loss of $0.8 million last quarter and a loss of $29.4 million during the first quarter 2018. As a percentage of revenues, income from operations was 2.1%.
• Interest income was $24.4 million, a 165.9% increase year-over-year, mainly attributable to a higher float in Argentina and Brazil, as well as the proceeds from the convertible note issued in August 2018.
• The company incurred $15.6 million in financial expenses in the first quarter of 2019, attributed to interest paid on the 2028 convertible notes.
• The foreign exchange loss for the first quarter of 2019 was $3.7 million, mainly as a consequence of the U.S. Dollar revaluation over our Argentine Peso net asset position in Argentina.
• Net income before taxes was $15.4 million, up from a loss of $25.4 million during the first quarter 2018.
• Income tax loss was $3.5 million, yielding a blended tax rate for the period of 22.7%.
• Net income was $11.9 million, resulting in basic net income per share of $0.13.
• Operating cash flow was $138.4 million. Net increase in cash, cash equivalents, restricted cash and cash equivalents was $841.6 million.

The Company will host a conference call and audio webcast on May 2nd, 2019 at 4:30 p.m. Eastern Time. The conference call may be accessed by dialing (877) 303-7209 / (970) 315-0420 (Conference ID 2466479) and requesting inclusion in the call for MercadoLibre. The live conference call can be accessed via audio webcast at the investor relations section of the Company's website, at http://investor.mercadolibre.com. An archive of the webcast will be available for one week following the conclusion of the conference call.

Foreign Exchange ("FX") Neutral – Calculated by using the average monthly exchange rate of each month of 2018 and applying it to the corresponding months in the current year, so as to calculate what the results would have been had exchange rates remained constant. Intercompany allocations are excluded from this calculation. These calculations do not include any other macroeconomic effect such as local currency inflation effects or any price adjustment to compensate local currency inflation or devaluations.

Founded in 1999, Mercado Libre is the largest online commerce ecosystem in Latin America, serving as an integrated regional platform and as a provider of the necessary online and technology- based tools that allow businesses and individuals to trade products and services in the region. The Company enables commerce through its marketplace platform (including online classifieds for motor vehicles, vessels, aircraft, services and real estate), which allows users to buy and sell in most of Latin America.

The MercadoLibre, Inc. logo is available at https://resource.globenewswire.com/Resource/Download/6ab227b7-693f-4b17-b80c-552ae45c76bf?size=0 

Any statements herein regarding MercadoLibre, Inc. that are not historical or current facts are forward-looking statements. These forward-looking statements convey MercadoLibre, Inc.'s current expectations or forecasts of future events. Forward-looking statements regarding MercadoLibre, Inc. involve known and unknown risks, uncertainties and other factors that may cause MercadoLibre, Inc.'s actual results, performance or achievements to be materially different from any future results, performances or achievements expressed or implied by the forward-looking statements. Certain of these risks and uncertainties are described in the "Risk Factors," "Forward-Looking Statements" and "Cautionary Note Regarding Forward-Looking Statements" sections of MercadoLibre, Inc.'s annual report on Form 10-K for the year ended December 31, 2018, and any of MercadoLibre, Inc.'s other applicable filings with the Securities and Exchange Commission. Unless required by law, MercadoLibre, Inc. undertakes no obligation to publicly update or revise any forward-looking statements to reflect circumstances or events after the date hereof.

This non-GAAP measure should not be considered in isolation or as a substitute for measures of performance prepared in accordance with U.S. GAAP and may be different from non-GAAP measures used by other companies. In addition, this non-GAAP measure is not based on any comprehensive set of accounting rules or principles. Non-GAAP measures have limitations in that they do not reflect all of the amounts associated with our results of operations as determined in accordance with U.S. GAAP. This non-GAAP financial measure should only be used to evaluate our results of operations in conjunction with the most comparable U.S. GAAP financial measures.

The Company believes that reconciliation of FX neutral measures to the most directly comparable GAAP measure provides investors an overall understanding of our current financial performance and its prospects for the future. Specifically, we believe this non-GAAP measure provide useful information to both management and investors by excluding the foreign currency exchange rate impact that may not be indicative of our core operating results and business outlook.

The FX neutral measures were calculated by using the average monthly exchange rates for each month during 2018 and applying them to the corresponding months in 2019, so as to calculate what our results would have been had exchange rates remained stable from one year to the next. The table below excludes intercompany allocation FX effects. Finally, this measure does not include any other macroeconomic effect such as local currency inflation effects, the impact on impairment calculations or any price adjustment to compensate local currency inflation or devaluations.