Freelancer Limited

Group GMV increased 30.9% to AUD 574.6 million, or USD 403.8 million. Revenue declined 12.1% to AUD 23.9 million, or was effectively flat at USD 16.8 million, and gross profit fell 10.4% to AUD 20.9 million while gross margin improved to 87.4%. EBITDA was AUD 1.1 million, operating loss was about AUD 0.3 million, and net loss after tax was AUD 2.1 million. Freelancer GMV declined 20.3% to AUD 42.4 million and revenue fell 23.2% to AUD 14.9 million; Loadshift GMV rose 9.6% to AUD 14.6 million and revenue rose 12.2% to AUD 1.8 million; Escrow GMV rose 39% to AUD 517.6 million and revenue rose 15.1% to AUD 7 million. Cash and cash equivalents ended at AUD 17.9 million, down from AUD 22.9 million at the start of the period, and the group remains debt-free. Management did not give formal next-quarter or full-year guidance, but said H2 focus is on removing Freelancer’s operational frictions, restoring SEO/organic traffic and payment conversion, while continuing Escrow and Loadshift growth.

Matt Barrie said the group is building an “Amazon of services,” but emphasized that the Freelancer marketplace had a difficult half because of scrapers, over-tight fraud controls, and a failed gateway migration. He was confident the company now understands the problems and has a fixable plan, especially around payments routing by country, currency, and device. He was notably optimistic about product changes, vertical marketplaces, and AI-assisted workflows, saying these should help drive higher-value work and better matching over time.

Dylan Carter framed the period as a mixed result: strong transaction growth at Escrow and Loadshift offset weak Freelancer activity. He highlighted cost discipline, noting employee expenses were 4.4% lower and hosting costs were down 5%, while operating expenses rose only 1.8% despite AI tooling and compliance costs. He also pointed to a $2.4 million non-cash impairment of non-core digital assets, a $0.9 million FX gain, and end-of-period cash of AUD 17.9 million with the business still debt-free. On Escrow, he said gross profit rose 21.8% to AUD 6.5 million and the take rate fell from 1.63% to 1.35% because of mix, but expected the take rate to return absent major one-offs.

The main analyst question focused on how much the payment gateway issues hurt the half, and management said one gateway alone was costing up to USD 400,000 per month. Asked about the total opportunity cost, management said the problem has likely dragged on the business for years because some gateways were running at only 30-something percent acceptance when they should have been closer to 80-something percent. On Escrow, management explained that leverage was partly obscured by transfer pricing and shared-cost allocation, while lower take rates reflected pricing by vertical and transaction mix rather than just deal size.