Rapidly growing in Latin America

Latin America has one of the largest and fastest-growing e-commerce markets in the world, but most people in the region still have limited or no bank accounts, limiting their ability to make digital payments and purchases online. That’s a huge opportunity for the region’s leading fintech and e-commerce company, MercadoLibre (Nasdaq: MELI).

The company generates revenue primarily from marketplace services and product sales, fees for fintech products such as credit and debit card transactions, and mobile payment commissions. Its operations are similar to Amazon.com and PayPal.

Total revenue nearly doubled year-over-year in Q1 to $4.3 billion (on a currency-neutral basis). Mercado-Libre continued to see strong double-digit percentage growth in active users. During the same period, unique active buyers in its marketplace business increased 16% year-over-year to 53.5 million, while fintech monthly active users increased 38% to 49 million.

The stock seems attractively valued at recent levels, with both its price-to-sales (P/S) and forward-looking price-to-earnings (P/E) ratios well below their five-year averages. (The Motley Fool owns and recommends MercadoLibre.) ¦