Anurag Singh Profile picture
Jun 29 20 tweets 10 min read
#Blinkit & #Zomato – Long thread:

1/n
Blurred to Opaque to Muddy
How to leverage a listed company to recover losses from failed ventures/adventures?

Danny DeVito famously said in namesake movie – There is only one thing I love more than my money -
"other people’s money"
2/n
Zomato announced that it plans to acquire Blinkit for a “consideration” of $ 578 Mn. We will revisit valuation later. Below is the snapshot of financials.

Who pays $578 Mn on unaudited financials of just 2 mths ? Not even even 1 quarter nos are provided.
@SEBI listening?
3/n
Is the company really growing topline at 162% as claimed ? This invites some curiosity. Where are the past YoY nos ?
I tried to dig out what I could with public reported info. Here is what the past looks like for #Blinkit .Revenues touched Rs 177 Cr in FY 2020 before covid
4/n
As quoted by the founders, pandemic “accelerated path to profitability” for Grofers & it was planning a listing by FY 2021.
No surprise the Rev. grew in FY’20, never mind the loss of Rs 637 Cr to “earn” a revenue of Rs 177 Cr.
5/n
Building narratives is a part of startup playbook. Delivering on guidance…. not important. After all who’s tracking ?
Have a glimpse of the narratives built for planned listing:
2019 – “We’re on track to deliver GMV of Rs 5000 Cr in FY’20”
Actual number ? Try searching !
6/n
2020 – Another bullish guidance:
“Grofers aims to reach $ 1 BN (Rs 7800 Cr) GOV by end of 2020”.
Actual achievement ? Try searching !
They haven’t achieved even half of this in latest reported numbers for 2022.
7/n
2021 – Another year, another guidance.
“Grofers is expecting to touch Rs 10,000 Cr by March 2021 as covid accelerated shift to e-commerce”.
Actual numbers ? Try searching !
Who's tracking?
8/n
2022 – the bull takes a breather. So it scaled down to its earlier projection of $ 1 BN GMV.
Dec 2021 – “Current GMV run rate is $ 600 Mn(Rs 4680 Cr) & aiming to hit annualized GMV of $ 1 BN for FY'22”
Notice that it is “monthly run rate”, not actual sales for the year.
9/n
Enter June 2022.
May be it was time to disclose something in “actual numbers” since Blinkit is getting acquired by a listed company. What does the company disclose ? Jan & May’22 nos only.
Why do you need anything more for "just" $ 578 Mn acquisition?
10/n
Let’s save that trouble for #Zomato. Here is how the YoY financial snapshot looks like:
Extrapolating Jan 2022 financials for the year, we see:

Revenues grew 50% in FY’22 after years since FY’20
#Blinkit is spending Rs 2713 Cr (Jan nos. x12) to "sell" orders of Rs 3546 Cr
11/n
More importantly, Blinkit is spending Rs 2448 Cr to “earn” a revenue of Rs 265 Cr. This for a company started in 2015.

2020 – Grofers says “it turned operationally profitable in 27 cities” with 2.6 Mn new customers.
2022 Jan - Blinkit has just 1.6 Mn active users
12/n
2021: Grofers now says “it plans to achieve profitability in 2021”. Roadmap to list in 2021 is intact, so of course are the stories that need to go along.
Actual profitability numbers for FY 21 ? Not disclosed
13/n
2022 June: Post acquisition plan, the tone is much subtle.
#Zomato CFO says “Given the early stage of business, it is very hard to commit a timeline for profitability……..it is possible in next 3 yrs, but it is an educated guess, not a guidance”.
Bravo !
14/n
Where does this brazen confidence come from ? This is where it turns from opaque to muddy.

#Zomato says the acquisition price is $ 578 Mn. Really ?

Zomato already had 9% stake. So valuation of Blinkit is higher.
Add to this another $ 150 Mn “loan” given in March 2020.
15/n
So what does the valuation of Blinkit add up to?
$578 Mn +57 Mn +150 Mn – cash on B/S)
Total = $ 720 Mn.
This is the actual price paid by Zomato for Blinkit.

Do you now how much money has been raised & spent by Grofers & Blinkit since 2015 ?
You guessed it : $ 700 Mn.
16/n
So how was the valuation of Blinkit arrived at ?
$ 700 Mn has been sunk in Grofers/Blinkit since inception. All that money has to be recovered by VCs. Since listing plans got derailed, plan B is to take money out from one of their own listed entities.
Welcome #Zomato
17/n
You don't even need hard cash. Bonus shares of Zomato are issued with share dilution of ~8%.
$ 700 Mn of losses in a failed venture Grofers (#Blinkit) is recovered in one shot in form of shares of the listed entity #Zomato.
Well played !!
18/n
Conclusion:

My concern is not with the promotors or VCs of #Zomato. After all they are in the business to make money & recover losses where they can.
My question is to the mutual funds who are investing retail money in such muddy ventures.
19/n

#DoorDash in US is valued at $ 28 BN in a $ 25 TN economy. An Indian replica venture with much poor metrics can’t be worth $ 8 BN. Zomato looks overpriced by 3x.
See comparison below:
n/n

Mutual funds who bought #Zomato are saying out loud –
We love to play with “Other people’s money”

I said this about #Paytm IPO in Nov'21. And it is worth repeating here:

If your mutual fund is still holding #Zomato
STOP that #SIP

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More from @anuragsingh_as

May 7
LIC IPO - Long Thread:
This could be the most hated thread of mine, coz who can argue with LIC fan base? But if your money is not going the right way, I’ll raise questions like I always do. With $3BN riding on #LICIPO , this could be the saving bet for many. Or so you hope…🧵
2/n
India’s Insurance density (Premiums/population) is very low & you will hear this most from insurers. India at $59 per capita premium appears to be in its "infancy" with huge upside ahead. Even with a base of 1.4 Bn people, this does look attractive for high growth. Right ?
3/n
Until you look at the YoY trend below (not found in DRHP, obviously). India has been stuck in this range since 2009. In-fact we have a falling trend with some spurts. This hardly looks like a growth market to me. So what happened here ? We’ll examine this later.
Read 24 tweets
Nov 8, 2021
#PayTmIPO – Long Thread:
There is a new game in town. The rules are “well laid out” by VCs – Report just 3 yr financials, blame flat sales since 2019 on covid, pick consultants to project fancy story, price IPO at 45 times sales, create scarcity of “limited offer” of 12% shares”
12% stake sale ~matches the “principal investment” by VCs. Oh, by the way, get some tranches of funding just before IPO that values your company closer to issue price. It’s like you buying your own house again for 2x price. May not work for you but somehow seems to work for VCs.
Now rope in mutual funds with 75% of this scarce offering (SIP money will go somewhere after all) & leave retail scrambling for 2.5% stake of a brand that is now a “household name”. Get brokerage firms & YouTube advisors to keep pumping story with same broken records from DRHP.
Read 25 tweets
Nov 1, 2021
#PolicybazaarIPO Long thread: There is monetary printing by RBI, there is lending by banks & finally there is the Indian IPO. “Foreign owned” company with ~1 Bn investment is selling “Indian” unicorn to “savvy” Indians for $ 6.2 Bn. Want to know how this printing works? Let’s go-
The basics: Rs 6017 Cr being raised by new shares (Rs 3750) & re-selling (Rs 2267). Face value Rs 2 offered at Rs ~1000 per share is one of a kind. Who decides the price? Examine the valuation ladder below.
With ~$ 150 Mn invested till 2017, we see $ 525 Mn rushes in after 2018
So, a company valued $1 Bn in 2018 & $ 1.5 Bn in 2019 by key investors like Tencent, suddenly “needs money” in March 2021. Falcon Edge “invests” all of $ 75 Mn in March at valuation of $ 2.65 Bn.
Enter IPO bankers a couple of months later & they value the company at $ 6.2 Bn
Read 25 tweets
Jul 16, 2021
However, despite all this, Zomato’s valuation grows from $ 3 BN to 8.6 BN in 18 mths. Now that’s an innovation at Zomato that I’m not willing to pay for. I’m sure they’ll find many who would like to own “fools gold”. I’ll pass.
Zomato listing – Follow up:
So what does an analyst do when listing surprises everyone. Well, he digs more.
At PE of 350, #ZomatoIPO beats DoorDash of US hands down. And we thought DoorDash is overpriced at PE of 143. Is it pricey? Image
Hell yes, it is VERY pricey. And if possibilities are immense, why did sales stay flat for last 3 yrs? What did we miss here? Takes us to the listing dynamics & why most stocks decline post listing pop phenomenon. Let's see some details.
Read 9 tweets
Jul 16, 2021
1)#ZomatoIPO : LONG THREAD: Once in a decade opportunity…. for some?

Is the IPO the golden opportunity for investors, as claimed by many? How much appreciation can one expect? A multi-year holding story or just a listing pop. This time it’s different, or is it? Let’s evaluate:
The authorized share capital of the Company is divided into 880 crore Equity Shares of face value Rs 1 each, paid-up share capital of the Company is Rs 666 crore.

IPO size: Rs 9,350 crore or $ 1.3 BN USD
Valuation of Zomato : Rs 66,000 crore or $ 8.8 BN USD

Ownership as below
Start with the balance sheet: We see B/S size increased almost 3 times in FY 21 vs FY 20. The equity infusion of Rs 7,643 cr in FY 21 just before IPO is not co-incidental? While this is not unusual for growth companies, this quantum change has an implications for shareholders.
Read 29 tweets
Dec 3, 2020
Long Thread on Farmers protests & Agri reforms: What is the protest all about? Who gets impacted & how? Why are protests concentrated in Punjab & Haryana? Are these really farmers or traders losing grip on monopoly? Are farmers being misled? Let numbers do the talking. Here we go
A top-down view of Indian production is in order here. What does India’s agriculture produce in a year? I like the below chart for FY 2015. Now to understand the complexity, we’ll have to work with one crop & dig details. Let’s work with Wheat. Image
In 2020, India is looking at 105 million tons of Wheat produce vs 94 mn tons in 2015. What does the growth look like? See below the YoY growth of wheat in India. A 105 mn tons in 2020 will bust the chart below. Forget nay-sayers,Indian agriculture is doing great production. Image
Read 27 tweets

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