ASOS' Efforts To Refocus the Business Bear Little Fruit So Far

Asos is a leading European e-commerce player in fashion and cosmetics focusing on the 20-something-year-old demographic segment. It offers more than 85,000 products on its website from its own label third-party brand partners. We believe that through its wide reach (over 26 million active users globally with over 12% of population reach in its home United Kingdom market), Asos benefits from traces of network, cost, and intangible asset advantages. Although we don’t believe those advantages are strong enough to warrant a moat, we expect the network effect and intangible asset advantages to strengthen over time as more customer traffic data is accumulated and better analytics allow improve conversion rates and customer loyalty; thus we grant Asos a positive moat trend rating.