Thank you. Thank you, and on behalf of the Zip board, I'd like to welcome everyone to Zip Co's first half fiscal 2021 results investor presentation. In the room with me today is Peter Gray, Co-founder and Chief Operating Officer. I also have with me Martin Brooke, our Chief Financial Officer. I have Tommy Mermelshtayn, our Chief Strategy Officer, and we're pleased to also be hosting the CEOs from the U.S. QuadPay founders, Adam Ezra and Brad Lindenberg. Before we kick off, I'd also like to thank the hard efforts of the entire Zip team, our Zipsters. We'd also like to thank retailers and, of course, our customers and loyal shareholders for what has been a bumper half. Also before we continue, I'd like to formally welcome Diane Smith-Gander as our new Chair.
Very excited to have her on board and also say farewell to Philip Crutchfield, who's been a fantastic mentor, advisor to us, and has steered this ship for the last five years. Finally, welcome Pippa Downes as well, as a non-executive director, who chairs our audit and risk committee. Today, I'll go through a few sections, a quick update on Zip. I will then talk about the U.S., which is a real growth engine for the business, followed by a look at Australia and New Zealand, then look at the globe and some of our other initiatives. I'll then hand over to Martin Brooke to look at the financial results, and then we'll talk about what's next. If we just flick to page four, a quick summary refresher on Zip.
Our purpose is the freedom to own it, that really speaks to quite a few vectors for us here at Zip, customers, merchants, responsibility, and our culture. It gives customers the freedom to own the dress, own the moment, own the experience, own their financial well-being. It talks to merchants, where we give them the freedom to own it, particularly the small business community, where they can grow their top line, get another customer, and now access working capital from Zip. We also own the responsibilities that come with issuing microcredit and financial services in real-time. Fourth, which we are most excited about and we see as a big differentiator, is the culture, the freedom to own it, where we build up an organization of single-threaded owners who are empowered, run different parts of the org.
We reward with Zip stock, who feel like business owners, we accelerate together. Our mission is to be the first payment choice everywhere and every day, and we've clearly got a long way to go. On slide five, I'd just like to talk to five key differentiators about the Zip business versus the peer set out there. First of all, our product. We offer interest-free installments for both short and long-dated periods, and that really allows us to play across any category set globally. We are on a roadmap this year to deliver feature parity across all of our markets. The second big differentiator is we derive income both from customers and merchants. That really gives us the ability to, again, play in any category, any gross profit category. Our customer fees are always fair, simple, transparent, and easy to understand.
We have proof points on that. The business model is both a closed-loop network where we acquire customers directly and have directly integrated commercial relationships. We also have open loop. That allows customers to shop everywhere, which drives habit. We'll talk to that later today. Fourth, we are actually one of very few global BNPL players where a single merchant can integrate with us and we can open up multiple markets, which is really important as commerce gets globalized. Finally, risk and financial responsibility is at our core. Since inception, we've done identity and credit checks. It's our superior risk decisioning and investment in these characteristics that enables us to grow quickly but also manage the risk ahead. On slide six is just a quick summary. We finished December run rating just over AUD 7.5 billion and annualized revenue of AUD 480 million.
What's really interesting, if you look at the geographic spread, is that we have four core markets, being the U.S., Australia, New Zealand, and we've just launched in the U.K. We also have a number of strategic investments, which are forming part of our network and that we can access and offer up to merchants, whether it's in Eastern Europe, the Middle East, or South Africa. If we turn to slide seven, we started out the year really with four key strategic priorities focused on payments acceptance, app engagement, global expansion, and Zip Business. Just a quick update on how we're tracking to those four priorities. On payments acceptance, particularly in Australia, we became a principal issuer with Visa, and we were able to really unlock the in-store potential.
In late October, we finished that project, customers can now use the Zip wallet to shop everywhere in physical, that's really stepped up our engagement rates, we'll talk to that. The U.S. has already had this functionality. In the U.S. as well, they rolled out a Chrome extension, which allowed the shop anywhere experience to be delivered via web as well as the app, we'll talk about that. Through a mixture of these techniques, we're not just available everywhere but also driving a lot of everyday spend, which is driving habit. Pleasingly, we grew the merchant base 73% year-over-year. On app engagement, it was really a standout for the half.
In Australia, we became the number one downloaded BNPL app, and that carried through into January, which is a great result for us with the relentless focus on app and UX over the last few years. In the U.S., the QuadPay app was the second most downloaded alt credit app during the holiday season, with over 2.8 million app downloads in the half and the customer base grew to 5.7. On global, we obviously completed the QuadPay acquisition in late August, with September being the first month, and that's been a great story, and we'll talk more about that. We launched in the U.K. in December, and that's really exciting. Pipelines building, we'll talk about that shortly. We made a number of strategic minority investments around the globe, underpinned by our new markets team. Finally, Zip Business.
This was really in beta post-COVID and a great team just working on what our product fit was going to be. That launched towards the end of last year under the rebranded Zip Business, which we'll talk about, secured two exciting partnerships in Facebook and eBay. Really good results there by the team. If we turn to slide eight, I think if we just go through the quick highlights. We've seen again, year-over-year growth across our key metrics of transaction volume, revenue, and customers north of 100%. As we've always said, growth really underpins our business model to take advantage of the BNPL opportunity globally. QuadPay, we completed in August as an entry into the U.S. to accelerate growth. Just since the beginning of September, the TTV for the U.S. has grown over 130%, which is just absolutely remarkable, and has been transformational for our business.
We bolstered the board with two key appointments, which I spoke about earlier, Diane and Pippa. Very excited to be working with them. We also, during the half, we raised AUD 176 million via an institutional placement and a share purchase plan. Really that was to fuel our global growth with a large chunk of that going into the U.S. Again, we had really outstanding support from our loyal retailer base. We're very pleased to accept all of the share purchase plans over subscriptions. Again, pleased to see that the price is trading well north of where they participated. We spoke about product innovation, quite a few highlights there, which we spoke about, and key partnerships. In Australia, Harvey Norman joined the platform and Domain. We've also secured Boohoo, JD Sports, and we'll get into the merchant list a little bit later on.
Just turning over to slide nine. What we've tried to do here is take another approach to how we show unit economics, and this really is in line with our peers, not just here, but also in the U.S. It really looks at unit economics on a per transaction basis. What is revenue as a percentage of transaction volume, less cost of sales, which are the transaction costs being processing data and losses, to get to what we call a cash gross profit as a percent of TTV. They call it a net transaction margin or transaction margin over in the U.S. I think pleasingly, when you look here, transaction volume grew 141% year-on-year. The revenue of AUD 159.8 million represented just north, just shy of 6.9% of TTV. If you go down, we have a margin of about 3.71%.
I think what you've seen there in the movement year-over-year is the shift in the business mix and also some exposure to more everyday categories. That's a really pleasing result and shows the disciplined unit economics that will be underpinning the growth of our business. Also, what's pleasing to note is cash EBITDA was positive, which is really a great result considering that we have a mature Aussie business, but also investing for growth globally. Martin will talk more in detail about our financial results. Moving over to slide 10. What we can see here is really a proven ability to execute across the globe. We finished the half with AUD 2.3 billion in transaction volume. That's on an actual basis, that's only including QuadPay transactions from the 1st of September. On a pro forma, that was AUD 2.5 billion.
Revenue, we finished the half at just shy of AUD 160 million, which is a great result. If you look at our fiscal 2020, that entire year was only AUD 160 million and really a great result there. The U.S., though, clearly is becoming a much larger share of the business. Just in December, they contributed 40% of TTV, and we expect them to overtake the Australian side very, very soon. Also pleasingly, transactions were up. That number is actually a pro forma number. If you look at our word release, you can see the actuals of 14.6 million transactions for the half. Really strong engagement. Finally, on slide 11, this is really an interesting story here where since the acquisition of QuadPay in late August, beginning of September, you can really see a step change in the business.
Repayments have really accelerated. We've been issuing installments from about six weeks to 48 months, with an average of about six months with assets on the balance sheet. What you can really see here is a shortening of six months all the way down to three, really being driven by the mix of the U.S. shorter dated installments, but also in Australia, post-COVID, better UX, better repayment flexibility, and that's having a much more efficient effect on our capital recycle, and that should underpin our future growth. Also, if you look on the return on capital, our revenue yield, which is revenue as a function of average receivables, has really stepped up from 16%-25%.
Again, showing really strong return on capital. When you combine our net transaction margin that we spoke about on the earlier page and this improves capital recycling, we think we are in a really good place to accelerate growth, drive operating leverage, and future economics. Finally, on slide 12, as we always say, even though we are seven years in, it really feels like we are only getting started. BNPL penetration is about 1.6% online. When you look in mature markets, that's about 20%. A long way to go. What we see across our business is 80% of our global customers are millennials and Gen Z, which will really become the purchasing power leaders over the next 10 years. We've got a really exciting long-term road ahead. Jumping into the U.S. on slide 14.
Really great results right across all of the key metrics. Almost 200% up on most of the key metrics. The pro forma TTV was up two and a half times year-on-year to just under AUD 1 billion. Our customer numbers grew to 3.2 million, again, up twice year-on-year. The pro forma revenue, which is very exciting, grew two and a half times year-on-year to just under AUD 70 million. Even though December was a real standout for the U.S. business, if you look in the January data, you're showing us that on a TTV basis, the business is almost back to November levels. A really good start to calendar 2021. The business continues to deliver market-leading unit economics with net transaction margins north of 2%. The app, which I'm going to talk about a little bit later, is a really exciting story.
Slide 15 really talks to offering buy now, pay later is important, but you have to offer it across all user journeys. In the U.S., you can now pay later at checkout integrated. You can pay later anywhere in-store. You can pay later anywhere online with merchants that we aren't integrated with, which we'll talk to shortly. You can pay anywhere using the Chrome extension, which enables virtual cards issued in the checkout and is showing really strong promise. The merchant base continues to expand. Retailers are critical to the business model, and we saw names like GameStop, which has obviously been in the press. We see it had another big jump last time, but a really great business and great fit for a buy now, pay later. Fanatics. We've just rolled out with Sunglass Hut in store, which is showing really strong promise.
Retail is a key. What we're finding is that the global footprint is really helping out our sales effectiveness, and the pipeline is really exciting. Of course, strategic partnerships are also a key part of the business model, how we get to not just one-to-one merchants, but one-to-many. We have a number of relationships here that we are working with, such as Fiserv and others, and are going to be a key part of our growth story over the coming years. Slide 17 and 18 really talk to the exciting business model that we have over in the U.S. A really strong ability to acquire customers directly and organically via the app as well as through merchants. These customers come into the app, they're able to then shop, and we're able to introduce and refer customers to our integrated partners, driving incremental transactions.
At the same time, we're able to offer customers places to shop outside the closed network, which is driving habit and driving preference. We can then use that data to go back in and talk to merchants around a directly acquired relationship. This is really starting to feed itself. It's driving really exciting transactions per monthly transacting user, and that's really underpinning the engagement model. Slide 18 just quickly shows you the incredible growth in the app. Huge investment has gone into the app with beautiful UX, a lot of experimentation. This organic growth is really providing a real strong moat around the business. Finally, with regards to the app on slide 19, the QuadPay app had over 2 million downloads just in a half, and pleasingly reached 15 in the shopping category during the shopping season on iOS.
Really bumping into some of the biggest names and really a testament to the work and laser focus of the U.S. team. Engagement via the app is up over 90% year-on-year. Real good leading indicators to what's ahead. Finally, just on credit performance. I think these two charts really tell a good story. Returning customers, which obviously deliver improved loss rates over time, has jumped from just north of 50%- 85% of monthly transactions. If you contrast that, in Australia, by way of comparison, we are over 95%. As a result of that, we're seeing really improved loss curves, charge-offs as a function of monthly transaction volume really coming down. Again, testament to the Chief Risk Officer, Kaustubh, over there and the decision technology that really underpins how customers are onboarded, how risk is discerned.
You can see as well on the chart how COVID was really dealt with, being able to respond in real time to the portfolio and the application funnel. Moving across to ANZ. Really pleased with the results in ANZ with the TTV up close to 60% to AUD 1.5 billion, and really strong results across all of the metrics. We had more customers join the platform than ever, which talks to the compounding network effects. Our customers completed two and a half million transactions just in the month of December, which was up 140% year-on-year. Again, showing that customers that are joining the network are becoming much more engaged.
They're coming into a world with better merchants. I might skip over slides 23 and 24 and just say, by way of reminder, we are unique in Australia being able to offer interest-free installments for small dollar and long duration, which is really important to merchants, and we can play in any category. We also signed a number of great names over the period, including Adore Beauty and Harvey Norman. A great result for the team on slide 25 was that the Zip app was the most downloaded BNPL app in Australia, which is a great title to have grabbed. You can see just on the right that monthly downloads have really scaled. I think, for us, we called out the app as a centerpiece to the relationship, and we see payments as the access point for the relationship with customers.
It's really important that we continue to remain laser-focused on that asset. On slide 26, what's really interesting is that each year we try to do better. We try to make sure that customers that are joining the Zip platform are more engaged. We can see a 70% growth in transactions per monthly transacting user year-over-year, from about two times per month to three and a half times per month, which is just north of 40 transactions if you calculate that on an annual basis. We are becoming more and more important to our customers. Revenue as well for cohorts is getting better year-on-year. In 2020, look, it was slightly up, but really what we're seeing here is that engagement has been through the roof. As I spoke about earlier, payments is the access point to us and the customer.
The more times that customers are using us, the more important we become, and the more valuable and the greater the LTV or long-term value is of the customer. Finally, on credit performance, again, our credit decisioning engine, which has been a consistent focus for us really since we started seven years ago. What began as a rules-based engine is now full machine learning model, particularly up to a few thousand dollars, we go all out to AUD 20,000 and AUD 30,000. Really, this decisioning engine that digests conventional and non-conventional data is showing improved cohort performance as we look from 2017 to 2020. Pleasingly, net bad debts of 1.9%, which shows our ability to really control the front end, control the portfolio, and during COVID, that was really tested. A great result by our credit team and our data and risk teams.
Moving over just to slide four, which encapsulates global Zip Business and Pocketbook. Zip Business was launched really towards the end of last year under the brand Zip Business. The product that we have now gone to market with is Zip Business Trade, and we were very pleased to sign both Facebook and eBay late last year. With Facebook, small businesses can now advertise now and pay later. We have a great team behind this part of the business. The road ahead over the next six months is incredibly exciting. The daily engagement rates and acquisition rates are all heading in the right direction, and we expect to report on those results later this year. Most of the activity is happening in the everyday buy now, pay later, up to about AUD 5,000.
The team is looking to also roll out a Trade Plus, so slightly larger SMEs that might be looking for working capital. We're really excited about the road ahead for Zip Business. It also really talks to the ecosystem play that we are trying to build, where sellers can offer Zip as a payment acceptance, but they themselves can also become Zip buyers, and hopefully, we can get more commerce happening around the Zip ecosystem. Moving on to slide 30, Zip launched officially in the U.K. in December and really off to a great start if you look at both December and January. We signed a couple of, sorry, just over 100 small merchants, which was good to get things going.
Pleasingly, the team has been able to sign some real marquee names in Boohoo, JD, Cotton On, and We're starting to see as well the ability to port our U.S. merchants into the U.K., similarly, our Aussie merchants into the U.K. Really, when we look at the go forward, we've got a great technology platform now in the U.K., which is on the same technology stack that QuadPay has built, and all of the feature sets that we have in the U.S. will be brought across to the U.K., which enables great app, great sign-up, virtual card, and shopping everywhere, as well as closed-loop networks. The global and the retailer pipeline is very, very exciting. Anthony Drury and the team is doing a fantastic job, and we look forward to reporting updates on the U.K. throughout the calendar 2021.
Last year, under our Chief Strategy and Global Officer, Tommy Mermelshtayn, we established a new markets function, which was a team specifically developed to look at both opportunistic and strategic expansion opportunities. They were behind the QuadPay deal, behind getting U.K. going. It's a team that has regulatory product tech, risk, and market launches. They've done a range of things this year, which is really exciting. Made a number of minority investments with great founding teams in Eastern Europe with Twisto. They have the ability to passport license across the EU. We also made a small investment in the Middle East, which we see as a really exciting region. Again, a great founding team. We're just starting to mobilize a small team in Canada.
Really the purpose there, given that the QuadPay stack just moves really nicely into that region, is really to support our U.S. business, to help us acquire and retain our U.S. merchants. We're looking for a soft launch there as well. We've moved our global integrations into new markets that a single merchant can integrate with us once, and we can now open up multiple markets, which is increasingly becoming exciting to more global retailers. On slide 32, Pocketbook is obviously a key part of our product set, up to 812,000 users. It's a free app that allows customers to track budget and save. Our view has always been that some customers are eligible for credit, some customers don't want credit, and we have a duty of responsibility to engage and provide market-leading experiences for them.
You'll see a lot more coming from this over the next year. That's it for a summary of the business. Obviously, we'll take questions later. I'll now hand over to Martin Brooke, our Chief Financial Officer.
Thanks, Larry. Starting with slide number 34. If we take a look at our information by segment, we split it between Australia, Global, and Zip Business. The exciting thing to see is that the U.S., which is part of the Global segment, is already 38% of our revenue. And that's with only four months of transactions going into there. We previously said that we would invest in growth while maintaining cash EBITDA positive in the AU business. Clearly, you can see that we've done that, generating a positive cash EBITDA of AUD 3.1 million, and also an overall positive cash EBITDA of AUD 200 grand. Clearly, a strong result there. Obviously, Zip Business is a small part of the group at the moment, but strong growth aspirations for the next half. Turning now to slide 35. We touched on the operating income previously.
Operating income now has been split between portfolio income and transactional income to reflect the different revenue streams acquired and also the new revenue streams at Zip. Transactional income really relates to affiliate revenue, interchange, and service fees. The portfolio income is the traditional merchant fees, establishment fees, and monthly fees recognized over the repayment profile, whereas the transactional income is recognized when earned. Cash cost of sales, AUD 73.7 million. Obviously, the inclusion of Quad makes a huge difference to these numbers. Key things to point out here is that on the interest side, the reduction in the BBSW by about 8% over the year has flowed through into our average interest costs. The bank fees and data costs, which are really pretty significant.
The volumes there give us a great opportunity to investigate reductions in the unit prices in line with those volumes on both the local and global scale. Healthy unit economics, as we've talked about previously, reflecting the cash gross profit of 54%, up from the 52% in the previous year. We've covered a little on the bad debt side on previous slides. On the operating cost side, increased by AUD 51.5 million, predominantly due to the acquisition of Quad. We're increasing headcount to scale the business globally. Obviously, we have an increased marketing cost to drive not only transaction volumes across all markets in a seasonally strongest quarter, but we also incurred additional costs in driving the launch of Tap & Zip . Ultimately, we hit a cash EBITDA of AUD 0.2 against AUD 1.5 in the previous year, as I kind of covered on the previous slide.
If we look at the terms of the provision for expected credit loss, important thing to note there is that we have reduced our overall provision from 4.4% to 3.8% across the group. That largely reflects the improvement in roll rates in the Australian business, slightly faster repayment profile in Zip Money, and a significant reduction in number of hardships in the business portfolio. We have maintained the economic overlay at the same level as we stuck at June, which obviously reflected the economic conditions at the time. Just turning over to page 36. Couple of key things to point out here. Significant increase in share-based payments, largely relating to the acquisition of Quad. The shareholders has approved some tenure and performance shares. Those tenure and performance shares, vest obviously based on tenure and the performance of the business.
Very pleased to announce that the first hurdle on the performance share side has been achieved. There will be $15 million in shares issued no later than September this year. As the tenure and performance shares are all linked to ongoing employment, they need to be reported as part of the P&L account and not really considered part of the cost investment in Quad. Fair value loss and the adjustment on Quad, we'll look at in the next couple of slides. If you look at slide 37, we recorded a QuadPay acquisition adjustment of net of some AUD 306 million. This obviously has no bearing on cash or the QuadPay business. Obviously, the achievement of the first performance hurdle suggests that the business is going very strongly, and it obviously is.
When we were negotiating Quad prior to COVID hitting in March, we were obviously in ongoing discussions. When COVID hit, the share price of Zip fell quite considerably. The other U.S. exchange rate deteriorated. In order to remove those market forces from the discussions, we agreed a share ratio with the vendors at Quad. That share ratio being essentially the shares would be issued equal to 23.3% of the issued share capital at completion. That essentially fixed the number of shares that we were going to be issuing, and all that was left was the price. Accounting standards demand that we use the price at the date shareholders approve the transaction, which was 31st of August at a share price of AUD 9.16. For the purposes of recording the initial purchase price, that there is no choice. That is considered fair value.
If you look at the graph on slide 37, I think there wouldn't be many people who'd think that AUD 9.16 was a fair value. That was our view. In conjunction with independent valuers, we looked at volume weighted average pricing up to the date of the transaction and formed a view that a fair value equivalent to some AUD 6.50 was much more appropriate. In conjunction with the fair value adjustment, we also had to revalue our existing 14.09% shareholding. If you look at the sequence, step one, on acquisition, we revalued our 14.09% up to AUD 9.16, which required us to report a fair value adjustment of AUD 109 million. The day after, we took a share value adjustment of AUD 415.9 to reflect a fair value equivalent of AUD 6.50 as opposed to the AUD 9.16.
For those of you who are looking to multiply the number of shares issued by the difference between the AUD 9.16 and AUD 6.50, that won't work because that adjustment applies to all of the consideration for paid for Quad, which was the shares issued, which was the replacement options issued to both employees and non-employees. Net adjustment of AUD 306, purely accounting, no impact on the business. Turning on to page 38. When we were looking to announce the acquisition of Quad, it was very important that we had funding to go with it. At the time, we looked at various different options. Our share price was down at AUD 3.70. The market for equity was not that great, quite turbulent.
Looking at those options, we came to the view that the issue of convertible notes and warrants would have a much less dilutive impact on shareholders. Therefore, we issued AUD 100 million in convertible notes with an initial conversion price of AUD 5.53, and AUD 100 million in warrants with an exercise price of AUD 5.15. Both significant premiums to the prevailing share price. When we account for these things, in the convertible note, you have to split it between a debt and a embedded derivative. The warrants are a derivative. We have to value the embedded derivative and the convertible notes and the warrants at fair value at each reporting date. In coming up with that value at December, using a share price of AUD 5.29, we ended up having to report a fair value loss of AUD 33.2 million.
It should be noted that the fair value is very sensitive to our share price. If we get to double the share price between now and 30 June at 30 June, it's at sort of AUD 10.60, we will be required to book a further fair value adjustment at that point of around AUD 160 million. Fairly volatile. Turning on to the balance sheet on 39. Obviously very much influenced by the addition of Quad. Significant cash on the balance sheet at December, largely reflecting the capital raise just prior to the end of the half year. Normally, we would have as much money as we can in the funding vehicles. Obviously, it's better for us to use our money to fund receivables rather than draw down on our financiers.
Obviously, with that coming through fairly close to the end of the year, that we weren't able to do that. The customer receivables number is obviously the biggest number on the balance sheet, supported by the increase in borrowings further down on the balance sheet. Investments that we made in Spotii, Twisto, all coming through in those investments lines. Other big things to call out on the acquisition of Quad, we had to value acquired intangible assets, which we have done on a provisional basis. That will be finalized at 30 June. That provisionally, we've recognized AUD 253.7 million of acquired intangibles, which comprise the brand name, the software platform, and partner relationships. They were all valued at the acquisition date. The other big item on the balance sheet, goodwill.
Obviously, that relates predominantly to the goodwill arising on the acquisition of Quad, being the difference between the purchase price, post-adjustment and the acquired intangible assets and the acquired assets. That goodwill number is around the sort of AUD 730 odd million for Quad. Looking further down the balance sheet, obviously, with bigger volumes across global businesses, the trade and other payables is largely payments to merchants, it's grown significantly. The financial liabilities is the debt host and the fair value of the embedded derivatives in the notes and the warrants at AUD 133.6 million, and the deferred tax liability arising on those acquired intangibles within the Quad business. Just moving on to the cash flow. Obviously, a positive cash flow, AUD 13.9 million, AUD 20 million if you exclude the acquisition costs. Up from AUD 6.7 million in the previous year.
Because we paid for quite largely in shares, acquiring [Carbon] brought a net AUD 26 million into the group. Rolling down the proceeds, obviously, from the issue of the convertible, that's AUD 96.8. That's net of costs. We had the capital raise where we received AUD 120 million in the year, and the money from the share placement came through in January. That's obviously not reflected in those numbers. Overall, an increase in cash of AUD 187.2 compared to the position at June. Moving to the funding update. Obviously, we're well-placed to support our growth plans with the funding programs in place. The key call-out there, within our consumer receivables portfolio in Australia, we have variable funding of about AUD 873 million. That enables us to generate new receivables from both new and existing customers.
We grow that core, we then term it out to the rated markets, repay the variable funding providers, we kind of repeat the process. That's a great position to be in within our most significant funding position. The excellent performance of our receivables portfolio meant we were able to receive a two-notch improvement in the rating of our senior note. Not quite at triple A yet, we would expect to get there shortly. Overall, we were able to get a 10-basis point reduction in the average rate across that transaction compared to the first transaction. We have $150 million facility in the U.S. with Goldman Sachs.
Because of the nature of the seasonality of the business, obviously huge volumes over Black Friday, Cyber Monday, repaid by the time we get to January, and we were able to repay $25 million of the drawn amount in January. Final thing to point out there is that we talked a little bit about the expectations for the Zip Business segment to grow in the next six months. We established an AUD 100 million facility with Victory Park Capital, who are in the half, to fund that growth. You may recall that they were the initial funders to the Zip back in the day, back in 2015. We have a long and healthy relationship with those guys. On that note, I'll pass back to Larry.
Thank you, Martin. Just finally, section six, what's ahead. Half year 2021 was our biggest result yet and is providing strong momentum into the second half. I think we're going into it with really strong tailwinds. We've got a great head start in the buy now, pay later space and a global footprint ready to take charge. The flight to online, which we saw accelerate last year as a result of the pandemic, we really believe is here to stay. The aversion to the credit card is continuing at pace. It's happened significantly over here in Australia. We're seeing these trends globally. We would argue that increased competition is increasing retail awareness, which actually is a huge net positive for us given our footprint globally. Of course, we are competing against the really slow banks.
I think we're in a really, really good place as long as we keep innovating and moving at Zip speed. The U.S. acquisition was clearly transformational to Zip, and as we have global momentum, there is going to be a huge focus in the U.S. U.S., U.S., U.S., as the board says. We'd also like to continue looking for opportunities and continue to accelerate our growth in the U.K. We're going to remain focused on those four key strategic priorities really at the top, which is continue the payments acceptance route, which is around getting customers to transact everywhere and every day through an increase in closed loop network. We need to continue to drive app engagement. That is the heart of the relationship, and we need to remain focused on that. We spoke about global expansion and Zip Business. There'll be a big focus on global sales.
We have a great pipeline. We're in discussion with a lot of great names, and our ability to offer, not just Australia, but the U.S., U.K., and other regions, is increasingly favorable for these retailers, and we look forward to announcing more names over the coming period. While we focus on growth, as we've shown on the slide around transaction margin, continue to make sure that the transaction margins remain healthy, unit economics remain sustainable. As we invest in fixed costs, we see the operating leverage come through as volume starts to expand. We're really excited about the road ahead, and thank you for listening. We'll now hand over to the moderator for questions. Cheers.
Thank you. If you wish to ask a question, please press star one on your telephone and wait for your name to be announced. If you wish to cancel your request, please press star two. If you are on a speakerphone, please pick up the handset to ask your question. Your first question comes from Jonathon Higgins with Shaw and Partners. Please go ahead.
Hi, guys. Obviously, a massive first half of 2021. A lot of initiatives launched. Just interested on a couple of points. Firstly, just around the app-based usage, the metrics, and sort of the customer adoption in the U.S. We're seeing average balances and average transaction sizes in Australia rising and the U.S. are rising materially as well as you've provided some new data on sort of repeat customers in the U.S. that looks pretty high around that 85%-90% level. Are you surprised as to the level of uptake and adoption in the U.S.? Secondly, just talk us through like what you are seeing in the U.S. from a competition point of view.
Yeah, thanks for that. We have Brad and Adam in the room, so one of them will take the U.S. question.
I don't think we're particularly surprised with the uptake. Our strategy from the outset has really been about enabling buy now, pay later anywhere
The acceptance size of the Visa network obviously allows consumers to shop wherever they want. That broadness of reach allows for the repeat purchase rate to be high, as they can use it when and wherever they want. I think the usage rates are in line with what we expect. We also expect that to grow over time as people become more used to shopping with QuadPay.
The second question, Jono, just the competitive landscape?
Yeah. Just talk us through just the competitive landscape and how it's playing out in the U.S. from your view?
Yeah, look, I think we're in a very large market. We truly feel that the market size is very large and the penetration is low, as you can see in the deck. There's a lot of runway there. There's obviously a number of competitors playing. I think there are differentiated approaches. Some of the key players only have the integrated network, whereas we have both sides and the flywheel. That really is driving a lot of the outperformance that you're seeing. Yeah, I think we're in a great position.
Just to add, I think, if you look at our product strategy globally, it is differentiated. The ability to offer short and long-term installments, that does resonate with the merchants and gets us alongside some of the peers. The ability to derive income from merchant and customer means we can also play in all gross profit categories, so there's a lot of categories versus other players. The global lens, the ability to offer up multiple markets. As I said earlier, even though competitive threats are out there, the pipeline is looking great and merchant conversions are accelerating.
Two last ones from me, just weaving onto that question, just in regards to the product portfolio. You are running with a single product internationally or mainly a single product. You've got a significant portfolio of other longer duration products and various interest-free and buy now, pay later products. Are you able to give us your thinking around the suitability of those products into the international market and when you'd look to take them there?
Yes. I think, as we've always said, being able to offer an interest-free installment, whether it's AUD 160 pair of shoes or a AUD 2,000 iPhone, is really important. We've proven that out here in Australia. Globally, Horizon One has been pay in 4 . We're actively working to deliver feature parity across all regions where you can pay in 3, pay in 6. I think there's a lot of proof points out there of why longer-term installments are really important and make a huge difference for a lot of big retailers out there. We'll be working on those products to add to the portfolio, but more on the consumer side. Don't expect to see Business go global anytime soon. It's still very much in a beta phase over here in Australia. We have to earn our stripes. Definitely focused on short and long-term installments in all markets.
U.S. is working on that right now, U.K. as well. You'll see some announcements from us throughout the year.
Last one from me, guys. Just on the unit economics, I know it's a real focus for you. Unit economics have held up really well through the half, and you've also delivered a flat result on the cash EBITDA front, which I think was probably a little bit surprising for us with the growth. Are you able to just talk us through just what we should expect around the gross margins into the second half and onwards? I don't think you've split out Quad versus Zip, but Quad obviously effectively has a higher turn and higher margin there. It just looks like gross margins are coming in ahead of expectations, and how should we think about that moving forward?
Yeah. Thanks for the question, Jono. I think we'd be expecting to sustain or improve gross margins over the second half.
I think we call out that's one of the strengths of our model and differentiated approach, Jono, and I think we expect that to continue to hold and remain a competitive differentiator of the Zip Co globally.
Does that help?
Perfect. Thanks, guys.
Cheers.
Your next question comes from Phil Chippendale with Ord Minnett. Please go ahead.
Hi, guys. Thanks for your time. A couple of questions from me. Firstly, probably for Brad and Adam. I just see you specifically mentioned the Anywhere product being a real focus for you, in U.S.
Sorry, Phil. Sorry, Phil.
Yes.
Phil, you sound a bit blurred. Are you able to maybe speak a bit clearly into the microphone?
Louder?
Louder.
How about now?
Go again. Go again, Phil.
Yeah. My first question just relates to the. Yes, are you there?
Yep. Go for it.
Okay. Just on the Anywhere product in the U.S., a question for Brad and Adam. You mentioned that was a real focus for you guys. I'm just wondering what percentage of your U.S. TTV comes from the Anywhere product against the relationships where you've got direct line of sight into a merchant like a Fashion Nova, et cetera?
Yeah, thanks for the question. Look, whilst we've spoken about the app, we're very focused on the integrated partner network, and the business is doing very well, bringing on board a number of well-regarded enterprise merchants. The merchant base is growing rapidly. These two models work hand-in-hand together. Just based on the performance, the downloads in the App Store, that's really driving a lot of first-time new users into the app, which then go into our integrated network and benefit our merchant base. Look, I don't want there to be thinking that we're not doing well on the merchant front.
Our core model is very important, and the two models are working nicely together.
Yeah. There's been a big uptick as well just in the merchant sign-ups as well-
Correct.
-over the last half. Merchants are being onboarded on an accelerated path. A lot of investment has gone into automated onboarding and big names are now starting to join as well.
Okay, thanks. Just turning domestically, the increase in capital efficiency and the rate of turning the book, in Australia, has that really been a function of increased usage, with Zip Pay? Yeah, just I'd love a comment as to what's driven that domestic increase in efficiency.
I think it's been a function of a number of initiatives, Phil. We've certainly focused on our repayments as a service to our consumers, encouraging them to pay back quicker, and offering them more flexibility, understanding the overall benefit it has to that yield concept. It's certainly been a significant area of focus that we have delivered through the app. As much as it's Zip Pay's penetration to everyday spend categories, which typically might have a shorter duration in terms of the repayment profile for that type of usage. It's probably the combination of a number of things. Having said that, Zip Money on the larger ticket stuff has also had improved velocity of repayment as well.
Okay, thanks. Just turning to Zip Business, you've identified that as a specific area of focus for you over the next 12 months. I'd be interested in a self-assessment of your progress with that rollout so far. Then just, as an outside observer, sorry, of the industry, we see a number of new players entering the space. Humm has recently announced a launch into that area as well, as well as more traditional sort of financiers in the space. It does seem to be reasonably competitive. How do you plan to differentiate your product into a new customer set, really?
I think, in answer to the first part of the question, Phil, we're probably well behind where we had expected to be by now. Clearly, there's been a number of external factors that have caused us to be a little bit slower, to some of the targets we'd probably set ourselves internally. I think, the success in partnering with eBay and Facebook really are yet to pay dividends with regard to the accelerated customer adoption. We're completing levels of integration to provide a seamless onboarding process for small business customers into Zip Business. That really will be one of the points of differentiation, is our core competency of that customer experience and that real-time decision, be it for a limit of AUD 3,000 all the way up to AUD 150,000.
The competitive peer set that you sort of touched on don't necessarily have the existing relationships across their platform. They don't necessarily have the competency at the risk assessment piece that really will allow us to provide great experiences for small businesses. There's a number of other initiatives that we're working on, which really will open up channels. We have a heavy focus on channels rather than individual retail relationships to deliver these customer acquisition piece. Probably a slightly differentiated strategy, with regard to some of the names that you mentioned. The likes of Facebook and eBay are just us getting started. A little bit slower in terms of the uptake because of external factors, but we're really hoping to deliver some strong growth there this half.
Yeah, I think the others are coming from a very different world. We've got a network of tens of thousands where small business can actually check out and use their Zip wallet. You'll start to get that sort of compounding effect. We're trying to build an ecosystem here where sellers can sign up in a few minutes. They can offer Zip at checkout. They can offer Zip online and in store. They can also get a Zip trade account, which is digital buy now, pay later. In the future, they'll be able to get settled into their account and then shop across the network, you start to get that sort of payments ecosystem. I think the others are thinking about it very, very differently.
Okay, thanks. Last question from me is just on the banking side of things domestically. You guys have had Pocketbook for a number of years now, and that's obviously a well-known budgeting tool. We have seen others in the space announce intentions to launch bank accounts, not just domestically, but also overseas. I'd sort of cite Klarna in Germany as one example. Yeah, I'd just be interested to know what you guys-
Sorry, Phil. Phil, we can't actually hear you. I think we'll need to move on to the next-
Next question.
-the next questioner. Thanks. Thanks, mate.
Okay.
Thank you. Your next question comes from Brendan Carrig with Macquarie. Please go ahead.
Good morning, gents. Just a couple of questions from me. Can we maybe start on the marketing side of things? It makes complete sense that you'd be investing a fair bit into marketing, but just wondering how we should be thinking about this line going forward as you're continuing to grow, and how this will be feeding into your customer acquisition costs across all of your jurisdictions.
We just had a bit of audio issues here. Are you asking about how marketing costs are expected to trend over time?
Yeah, effectively. Obviously, there's been a reasonable step-up, which you would expect given the move into the U.S.
Yep.
I'm just wanting to get a bit more of an understanding as to how that will be continuing to trend given the growth profile you're targeting from here.
I think, look, the way that we think about use of funds, a chunk of that is for marketing, both acquisition, but also a lot of retail partnerships. That's kind of where a lot goes into. Very disciplined the teams are around what does that mean in terms of re-engagement, in terms of customer acquisition costs. If you just look at our channels versus the world of credit cards
tax are just miles and miles apart. I think as the surface area increases, you will see marketing spend increase, but done in a very disciplined way, where we identify channels, retail partners, and where we're ensuring we are signing up the right number of customers, those customers are remaining engaged. That comes all into Steve Brennen, who's our Global Chief Marketing Officer. He's sort of growing the governance around marketing spend. We obviously allocate budget, but jurisdictions and teams can't unlock that budget unless they achieve the gates. We do expect that number to increase. It came off a very, very small base given the size of the footprint, and also the U.S. is a real big focus for us. How we get the brand out there, how we work with retail partners is going to be a huge focus over the next 12 months.
Yeah, that's clear. Just while still on that cost line, the bank fees and the data costs, sort of moved ahead of where your revenue growth was or at least your volume growth has been. Is there anything else that play there that I should be considering or thinking about going forward?
Sorry, I didn't quite catch. What was the question again, Brendan?
Just on the bank fees and data costs that you're experiencing. A reasonable step up. Are these moving up ahead of your TTV and your revenue, or they appear to be? I'm just thinking, are there any, I guess, shifts in the proportion of these costs relative to your revenues?
No, that suggests whether the unit economics have gone up, and the answer to that would be no. It's really a focus for the next sort of, going forward, is really to take advantage of the volumes that we're generating locally and globally to drive those economics down. There's been no fundamental change in any of that.
Okay, awesome. Then the last question I had, just maybe flipping a question that was asked earlier a different way. Potential for expanding the Australian products offshore, but conversely, you talk about the better capital recycling and the advantages of paying for products that you're seeing offshore. Would there be any potential or any scope to bring a product such as that to domestic, to the Australian market?
The short answer is no. Our short-dated product here is our pay-by-account, which we actually really enjoying. We've seen obviously great results from that. This everyday account for us is our go-to-market strategy here. That product set does get more challenging globally, because of some of the regulatory environment, and is able to be launched quickly and done, obviously, responsibly. For us, our product here is really the pay-by-account which is Zip Pay, and we have long-term installments which really is the Zip Money piece. No change expected here.
Just apologies for the audio we're experiencing. I'm getting some messages through that you guys can hear the other callers okay. It's very muffled from where we are sitting, apologies for that.
Yeah, I think it might be the storm that we're seeing. Just finally, just on the provisions side, is there anything else at play aside from the reduction in that expected loss from 4.4% to 3.8%? Just conscious of the fact that your receivables and volumes have gone up significantly, and then that dollar value's down versus the PCP.
Yeah, the provision is determined through our ECL model. Basically that takes the roll rates, which are factual, rolls them through as performing and non-performing receivables. That is what it is. We get to a number there, and then we apply an economic overlay. That economic overlay, as a percentage, has remained unchanged from June to December. Really it is just an improvement in, or largely an improvement in those roll rates over the period.
Directly in line with the improving performance.
Yeah.
Arguably, the provision is extremely conservative given the actual losses experienced. Obviously that is related to that number coming down.
Yeah.
Okay, thanks. I'll leave it there for the next person.
Thanks. Cheers.
Your next question comes from Tim Piper with RBC Capital Markets. Please go ahead.
Morning, team. Thanks for taking the question. I'll just add another one around the unit economics, just given the focus that you have on that and talk of valuation, et cetera. I guess when we used to look at the Oz business and when we look at the business, it's always been a yield on receivables that we've kind of looked at. I noticed that obviously you've integrated QuadPay in now, which the paying for is more of a transaction margins, percentage of volume, et cetera.
Tim.
in the Oz business-
Sorry, Tim.
Are we still-
Tim, I think we've got audio issues here in the boardroom. I think we're getting a couple of messages here coming through. I think we'll probably have to call it here, and what we'll do is we'll give you Whoever else had, we can see who's in the caller line now. We'll set up calls for you guys after.
Thanks.
Thanks, everyone, and thanks for listening. We'll touch base with the research analysts later today. Cheers.