New from us—Facedrive: A $1B+ ESG Stock Promotion with a Hollow Core Business, Flailing Business Pivots and Multi-Million Dollar Payments to an Opaque BVI Entity; 95% Downside
recently went public with the core premise of being an “eco-friendly” ride hailing app allowing users to select electric vehicle or hybrid options.
EV excitement has fueled the stock to a ludicrous $1.4 billion market cap and an absurd 908x revenue multiple.
's already-limited Canada-based ridesharing business appears to have been dramatically impaired by COVID.
While the company claims 13,000 registered drivers on the platform, we estimate current active drivers at ~500-600 total, suggesting a 95% overstatement.
Facedrive has very few users, minimal resources, and no sustainable differentiator in ridesharing.
Uber or Lyft could easily add electric vehicle options if they ever felt it worthwhile to eliminate Facedrive’s supposed ‘niche’.
Rather than focusing on tackling just one resource-intensive highly competitive market like ridesharing, recently entered a second—food delivery.
We found Facedrive’s platform has a total of 17 restaurants compared to UberEats' 400,000 and GrubHub's 300,000
We called several of the “most popular” restaurants on the Facedrive Foods page. One didn't seem to have a working phone number, and two said they don’t use Facedrive anymore.
Facedrive even joined the COVID-hype train, launching a COVID contact tracing app. We reached out to their partner on the project who confirmed what appears to be overstatements of the projects’ publicly stated progress.
has spiked on a slew of buzzword-laden press releases, helped by stock promoters who received payment through an opaque newly-renamed BVI-registered entity.
The site admits in its disclaimers that stocks it touts often plunge after their promotion cycle ends
In June 2020, paid $8.2M to an opaque newly named BVI entity for 1 month of “marketing” services.
This is the largest promotion payment we have ever seen and was greater than Facedrive’s entire operating budget over the last year.
Additionally, the company has engaged in multiple related party transactions. Its 2019 filing statement detailed paying 4 entities controlled by its CEO, representing approximately 24% of its 2019 operating expenses.
We do not think 's core business is viable & we find its “marketing” and related party spends to be alarming.
We have serious doubts about the veracity of the company’s claims relating to its ill-conceived side projects that appear hastily thrown together for PR value
's CEO has a history that bodes poorly. He was Chairman/CEO of another a public company, Creative Vistas, which saw its shares precipitously plummet by ~99%.
We believe this “story” stock is heading toward a hard repricing, as we see de minimis overall value in the company’s operations.
Our 1-year price target for is CAD $0.70, representing 95% downside
$AILE is a self-described “AI-powered learning automation” software company based in Bethesda, Maryland that was incorporated in 2010 and went public via a SPAC deal in April 2024.
(2/x)
The company claims to be an “early pioneer in enterprise AI” operating in the corporate and educational learning space.
We disagree. We suspect both $AILE's revenue and expenses are largely fake.
Super Micro Computer Inc. is a $35 billion server maker based in Silicon Valley, California that has ridden the wave of AI enthusiasm.
(2/x)
Our 3-month investigation, which included interviews with former employees & experts as well as a review of litigation & customs records, found glaring accounting red flags, evidence of undisclosed related party transactions, sanctions and export control failures & customer issues.
Buch’s response now publicly confirms her investment in an obscure Bermuda/Mauritius fund structure, alongside money allegedly siphoned by Vinod Adani. She also confirmed the fund was run by a childhood friend of her husband, who at the time was an Adani director.
SEBI was tasked with investigating investment funds relating to the Adani matter, which would include funds Ms. Buch WAS PERSONALLY INVESTED IN and funds by the same sponsor which were specifically highlighted in our original report.
This is obviously a massive conflict of interest.
(2/x)
Buch’s statement also claims that the two consulting companies she set up, including the Indian entity and the opaque Singaporean entity “became immediately dormant on her appointment with SEBI” in 2017, with her husband taking over starting in 2019.
Per its latest shareholding list as of March 31st, 2024, Agora Advisory Limited (India), is still 99% owned by Madhabi Buch, not her husband.
This entity is currently active and generating consulting revenue.
Furthermore, Buch remained a 100% shareholder of Agora Partners Singapore until March 16th, 2022, per Singaporean records, owning it during her entire time as a SEBI Whole Time Member. She only transferred her shares into her husband’s name 2 weeks after her appointment as SEBI Chairperson.
Axos Financial $AX is a $3.1 billion market cap regional bank headquartered in San Diego, California that was incorporated in 1999 and went public in March 2005.
(2/x)
$AX trades at a 35% P/TBV premium compared to similarly sized community and regional banks, pricing in investor expectations of outsized growth, a low-risk loan book and multiple years of runway ahead.
$EQIX is an $80 billion market cap data center REIT with over 260 facilities globally.
It has 10,000+ customers, ranging from small businesses to large cloud “hyperscaler” providers like Amazon, Microsoft and Google.
(2/x)
Even if you ignore our findings & take the financials of $EQIX at face value, the company trades at elevated levels; an ~86% premium to its peers on a price to forward AFFO basis and a ~59% premium on a price to forward FFO basis.