Director | Exposing Creative Accounting, Bucephalus Research Partnership

Robert Medd

Director | Exposing Creative Accounting

Exposing Creative Accounting

Bucephalus Research Partnership

Bucephalus Research Partnership Limited. Exposing Creative Accounting.

At the Bucephalus Research Partnership (BRP) we analyse financial statements using our accountant's practical experience and our own quantitative algorithms for corporate governance, accounting risk and peer performance.

Our thematic research refines our unique algorithms while our single stock research focuses on examples where we discover a significant gap between published accounts and business reality.

​Bucephalus Research Partnership:
- Is an independent fee-based research service
- Does not take proprietary positions, long or short
- Does not solicit business or fees from the corporates we review

Forensic Accounting

Inflated profits, aged assets, negative cashflow
JFE has been inflating profits by under depreciating and cashflow by underinvesting. In FY2019, it will barely breakeven and liabilities may rise by Y400bn. FY2020 will be far worse. Even before COVID, Japanese demand was falling and the steel cycle was turning down. At today’s non trough steel spreads, JFE is lossmaking and business cashflow is structurally negative. By YE FY20, JFE will have raised Y300bn plus the Y30bn of maturing bonds to fund the renewal of its over-valued, aging assets. It has listed non core assets, but debt will be over 8x EBITDA. No covenants mean debt can keep rising, but will never be repaid. Equity holders will be wiped out. SELL.

Inflated profits, aged assets, negative cashflow
JFE has been inflating profits by under depreciating and cashflow by underinvesting. In FY2019, it will barely breakeven and liabilities may rise by Y400bn. FY2020 will be far worse. Even before COVID, Japanese demand was falling and the steel cycle was turning down. At today’s non trough steel spreads, JFE is lossmaking and business cashflow is structurally negative. By YE FY20, JFE will have raised Y300bn plus the Y30bn of maturing bonds to fund the renewal of its over-valued, aging assets. It has listed non core assets, but debt will be over 8x EBITDA. No covenants mean debt can keep rising, but will never be repaid. Equity holders will be wiped out. SELL.

Pan-Asia Catalysts/Events, Quiddity Advisors

Travis Lundy

Pan-Asia Catalysts/Events

Quiddity Advisors

Quantitative Analysis

The GPIF is the world's largest pension fund at what was $1.6 trillion-plus at the end of December 2019. The management of the GPIF has made remarkable strides in recent years, moving towards market targets for returns of all assets (no more FILP bonds), creating a win-win profitability structure for active managers on multi-year mandates (up to five to seven years it seems), and demanding accountability on stewardship policies and efforts. In March 2010, the GPIF lowered its domestic bond portfolio bogey from 67% to 60% (which was good because it was already there),  and raised its domestic equity, foreign bond, and foreign equity allocation mix midpoints to 12%/11%/12% from 11%/8%/9%. Short Term Assets were set at 5%. In June 2013, they realized they needed to be more aggressive, and so the GPIF spent more than a year studying the problem, having experts in, looking at allocation mixes and trying to be more professional about assessing their liability profile and curve, and decided in October 2014 to implement a much different mix, moving domestic bonds to 35% ±10%, domestic equities to 25% ±9%, foreign bonds to 15% ±4%, and foreign equities to 25% ±8%. There was no bogey for Short Term Assets, but that was assumed to be wrapped up in the domestic bonds portion as a concept.That meant buying equities, and they did.They had already been buying and by the time they announced the new policy in October 2014 officially, they had already gone through the old limits on domestic equities and were at 18.2% (the old upper limit was 18.0%). It took them until March 2015 to get to 22%, and by June they were at 23.4%. Basically, they then let it ride, with some small changes here and there. The big changes were constant reductions in the domestic bond allocation. However in FY15 (year to March 2016) there was an episode of equity buying. That is probably something those interested in flows should study now. The GPIF is currently said to be in the process of conducting an Investment Policy Review. The lead-up to this has seen a number of changes which hint at what could come.<ol>
<li>
The GPIF has become very ESG-focussed. Some of that is the G portion where they talk about being long-term investors, and they have made it mandatory for their investment managers to have a stewardship policy and report on how they execute that policy. They are also looking very much at the longer-term, and CIO Mizuno has blasted short-sellers and any number of other market participants for being short-term (I had issues with a bunch of the comments reported in the FT so got a <a href="https://ftalphaville.ft.com/2020/01/14/1579000419000/The-GPIF-and-the-complexity-of-stewardship/" target="_blank" rel="noopener">letter to Alphaville</a> published - Thanks Jamie!).</li>
<li>The GPIF has started looking at real estate.</li>
<li>
The GPIF has decided that foreign credit which is yen-hedged can be put into the domestic bonds allocation bucket. This means a higher allocation to foreign issuer risk than the old limit.</li>
<li>
The GPIF has stopped lending stocks. This reduces fee income to passive portfolios (foreign equity, as domestic equity lending has never been done, or at least not in many, many years) but it means more pressure on company management.</li>
<li>
The GPIF has changed the way contracts work for active managers. The base concept, according to interviews and articles, is that the active manager gets the same very low management fee on AUM as a passive manager does, but the active manager shares in the upside over the life of the contract, which will be "one market cycle" (i.e. five years, or seven years, or whatever they settle on with the GPIF). This should, ceteris paribus, lead to further outperformance. </li>
</ol>All of these things would, in my mind, point to a higher domestic equity allocation, a higher foreign bond allocation, and a shift to more active management and less passive management in domestic equities (last year the split was 90% passive 10% active). But there are shorter-term factors investors should be looking at. More discussion below.

The GPIF is the world's largest pension fund at what was $1.6 trillion-plus at the end of December 2019. The management of the GPIF has made remarkable strides in recent years, moving towards market targets for returns of all assets (no more FILP bonds), creating a win-win profitability structure for active managers on multi-year mandates (up to five to seven years it seems), and demanding accountability on stewardship policies and efforts. In March 2010, the GPIF lowered its domestic bond portfolio bogey from 67% to 60% (which was good because it was already there),  and raised its domestic equity, foreign bond, and foreign equity allocation mix midpoints to 12%/11%/12% from 11%/8%/9%. Short Term Assets were set at 5%. In June 2013, they realized they needed to be more aggressive, and so the GPIF spent more than a year studying the problem, having experts in, looking at allocation mixes and trying to be more professional about assessing their liability profile and curve, and decided in October 2014 to implement a much different mix, moving domestic bonds to 35% ±10%, domestic equities to 25% ±9%, foreign bonds to 15% ±4%, and foreign equities to 25% ±8%. There was no bogey for Short Term Assets, but that was assumed to be wrapped up in the domestic bonds portion as a concept.That meant buying equities, and they did.They had already been buying and by the time they announced the new policy in October 2014 officially, they had already gone through the old limits on domestic equities and were at 18.2% (the old upper limit was 18.0%). It took them until March 2015 to get to 22%, and by June they were at 23.4%. Basically, they then let it ride, with some small changes here and there. The big changes were constant reductions in the domestic bond allocation. However in FY15 (year to March 2016) there was an episode of equity buying. That is probably something those interested in flows should study now. The GPIF is currently said to be in the process of conducting an Investment Policy Review. The lead-up to this has seen a number of changes which hint at what could come.

The GPIF has become very ESG-focussed. Some of that is the G portion where they talk about being long-term investors, and they have made it mandatory for their investment managers to have a stewardship policy and report on how they execute that policy. They are also looking very much at the longer-term, and CIO Mizuno has blasted short-sellers and any number of other market participants for being short-term (I had issues with a bunch of the comments reported in the FT so got a letter to Alphaville published - Thanks Jamie!).
The GPIF has started looking at real estate.

The GPIF has decided that foreign credit which is yen-hedged can be put into the domestic bonds allocation bucket. This means a higher allocation to foreign issuer risk than the old limit.

The GPIF has stopped lending stocks. This reduces fee income to passive portfolios (foreign equity, as domestic equity lending has never been done, or at least not in many, many years) but it means more pressure on company management.

The GPIF has changed the way contracts work for active managers. The base concept, according to interviews and articles, is that the active manager gets the same very low management fee on AUM as a passive manager does, but the active manager shares in the upside over the life of the contract, which will be "one market cycle" (i.e. five years, or seven years, or whatever they settle on with the GPIF). This should, ceteris paribus, lead to further outperformance. 
All of these things would, in my mind, point to a higher domestic equity allocation, a higher foreign bond allocation, and a shift to more active management and less passive management in domestic equities (last year the split was 90% passive 10% active). But there are shorter-term factors investors should be looking at. More discussion below.

Pan-Asia Index Rebalances/ Events/ Delta One, Periscope Analytics

Brian Freitas

Pan-Asia Index Rebalances/ Events/ Delta One

<div>The short notional in the market for the data released 17 March is US$22.75bn (up by US$604mm excluding FX movements) with the largest short positions in <a href="https://www.smartkarma.com/entities/itochu-corp" target="_blank" rel="noopener" data-smartkarma-citation="entities:18448:1">Itochu Corp (8001 JP)</a>, <a href="https://www.smartkarma.com/entities/toyota-motor-corp" target="_blank" rel="noopener" data-smartkarma-citation="entities:73:1">Toyota Motor (7203 JP)</a>, <a href="https://www.smartkarma.com/entities/fast-retailing-co-ltd" target="_blank" rel="noopener" data-smartkarma-citation="entities:751:1">Fast Retailing (9983 JP)</a>, <a href="https://www.smartkarma.com/entities/canon-inc" target="_blank" rel="noopener" data-smartkarma-citation="entities:1:1">Canon Inc (7751 JP)</a> and <a href="https://www.smartkarma.com/entities/taiyo-yuden-co-ltd" target="_blank" rel="noopener" data-smartkarma-citation="entities:9924:1">Taiyo Yuden (6976 JP)</a>.</div><div>Most shorted stocks as a percentage of free float are <a href="https://www.smartkarma.com/entities/anritsu-corp" target="_blank" rel="noopener" data-smartkarma-citation="entities:3700:1">Anritsu Corp (6754 JP)</a>, <a href="https://www.smartkarma.com/entities/taiyo-yuden-co-ltd" target="_blank" rel="noopener" data-smartkarma-citation="entities:9924:1">Taiyo Yuden (6976 JP)</a>, <a href="https://www.smartkarma.com/entities/aruhi-corp" target="_blank" rel="noopener" data-smartkarma-citation="entities:26072:1">Aruhi Corp (7198 JP)</a> and <a href="https://www.smartkarma.com/entities/tokai-carbon-co-ltd" target="_blank" rel="noopener" data-smartkarma-citation="entities:9145:1">Tokai Carbon (5301 JP)</a> while the stocks with the highest days to cover are <a href="https://www.smartkarma.com/entities/nitta-gelatin-inc" target="_blank" rel="noopener" data-smartkarma-citation="entities:1481:1">Nitta Gelatin (4977 JP)</a>, <a href="https://www.smartkarma.com/entities/vital-ksk-holdings-inc" target="_blank" rel="noopener" data-smartkarma-citation="entities:7398:1">Vital Ksk Holdings (3151 JP)</a>, <a href="https://www.smartkarma.com/entities/j-trust-co-ltd" target="_blank" rel="noopener" data-smartkarma-citation="entities:20246:1">J Trust Co Ltd (8508 JP)</a>, <a href="https://www.smartkarma.com/entities/katakura-industries-co-ltd" target="_blank" rel="noopener" data-smartkarma-citation="entities:2007:1">Katakura Industries (3001 JP)</a> and <a href="https://www.smartkarma.com/entities/itochu-corp" target="_blank" rel="noopener" data-smartkarma-citation="entities:18448:1">Itochu Corp (8001 JP)</a>. </div><div>The largest increases in short notional over the week were <a href="https://www.smartkarma.com/entities/familymart-co-ltd" target="_blank" rel="noopener" data-smartkarma-citation="entities:320:1">Familymart UNY Holdings (8028 JP)</a>, <a href="https://www.smartkarma.com/entities/mitsubishi-ufj-financial-gro" target="_blank" rel="noopener" data-smartkarma-citation="entities:218:1">Mitsubishi UFJ Financial (MUFG) (8306 JP)</a>, <a href="https://www.smartkarma.com/entities/nippon-steel-corporation" target="_blank" rel="noopener" data-smartkarma-citation="entities:961:1">Nippon Steel Corporation (5401 JP)</a> and <a href="https://www.smartkarma.com/entities/trend-micro-inc" target="_blank" rel="noopener" data-smartkarma-citation="entities:13172:1">Trend Micro Inc (4704 JP)</a> while shorts were covered in <a href="https://www.smartkarma.com/entities/seven-i-holdings-co-ltd" target="_blank" rel="noopener" data-smartkarma-citation="entities:1041:1">Seven &amp; I Holdings (3382 JP)</a>, <a href="https://www.smartkarma.com/entities/fuji-heavy-industries-ltd" target="_blank" rel="noopener" data-smartkarma-citation="entities:5439:1">Subaru Corp (7270 JP)</a>, <a href="https://www.smartkarma.com/entities/kao-corp" target="_blank" rel="noopener" data-smartkarma-citation="entities:12933:1">Kao Corp (4452 JP)</a> and <a href="https://www.smartkarma.com/entities/fast-retailing-co-ltd" target="_blank" rel="noopener" data-smartkarma-citation="entities:751:1">Fast Retailing (9983 JP)</a>.   <a href="https://www.smartkarma.com/entities/tokai-carbon-co-ltd" target="_blank" rel="noopener" data-smartkarma-citation="entities:9145:1"></a></div><div>Sectorally, short positions increased in Industrials (US$188m), Information Technology (US$186m) and Materials (US$139m), while shorts were covered in Consumer Staples (US$46m) and Consumer Discretionary (US$20m).</div>

The short notional in the market for the data released 17 March is US$22.75bn (up by US$604mm excluding FX movements) with the largest short positions in Itochu Corp (8001 JP), Toyota Motor (7203 JP), Fast Retailing (9983 JP), Canon Inc (7751 JP) and Taiyo Yuden (6976 JP).Most shorted stocks as a percentage of free float are Anritsu Corp (6754 JP), Taiyo Yuden (6976 JP), Aruhi Corp (7198 JP) and Tokai Carbon (5301 JP) while the stocks with the highest days to cover are Nitta Gelatin (4977 JP), Vital Ksk Holdings (3151 JP), J Trust Co Ltd (8508 JP), Katakura Industries (3001 JP) and Itochu Corp (8001 JP). The largest increases in short notional over the week were Familymart UNY Holdings (8028 JP), Mitsubishi UFJ Financial (MUFG) (8306 JP), Nippon Steel Corporation (5401 JP) and Trend Micro Inc (4704 JP) while shorts were covered in Seven &amp; I Holdings (3382 JP), Subaru Corp (7270 JP), Kao Corp (4452 JP) and Fast Retailing (9983 JP).   Sectorally, short positions increased in Industrials (US$188m), Information Technology (US$186m) and Materials (US$139m), while shorts were covered in Consumer Staples (US$46m) and Consumer Discretionary (US$20m).

Independent Asian Credit Research, Bondcritic

Warut Promboon

Independent Asian Credit Research

Asian Fixed Income/Frontier Market Research

Bondcritic

Bondcritic, established in 2009, is designed to be an independent credit research voice that helps investors gain insights and unbiased analyses on Asian fixed income market. Our mission is to discover deep-value Asian high-yield and distressed bonds with a bottom-up approach, together with the help of our proprietary ESG (Environmental, Social Development, and Governance) model. At the same time, we focus on bringing investment cases of unrated and unloved issuers to the general public.

Thematic (Sector/Industry)

A month after we pointed out the risk emanating from the new strain of a Corona virus (COVID-19) to the global economic recovery, the market still cannot fathom how bad this crisis will be. We were worried on the local outbreak outside China and here we are, the outbreaks in the US, Italy, France, Germany, Spain, and Iran; away from Asia where it all started.
Though we heard it could take anywhere from 12-18 months to develop the vaccine and the situation in China is improving, the situation in the western hemisphere is no nowhere near the peak. Assuming China has gone over the peak in 2 months (mid-January to mid-March) and it will take the western hemisphere and Iran to go over the peak in exactly the same duration, 2 months is a long time and anything can happen, in our view. Then after mid-May when the “carpet bombing” will have finished, we still need to re-assess the damage which could take months to know factually. The two unknowns are (1) how bad the infection would be in the US and Europe, given the level of unpreparedness, and (2) how much damage this virus will be on the global economy.
We are of the opinion that the damage will be very difficult to gauge as the proportion of the virus infection has never happened in recent history. We are of the opinion that COVID-19 fears will be here to stay until the vaccine is successfully developed. The return of COVID-19 in September after the summer in northern hemisphere cannot be ruled out.
We believe central banks are seeing what we see and will come out with more quantitative easing measures and fiscal stimulus in such a large scale, following the US Federal Reserve (Fed) and Bank of England’s recent 50-bp cut. A failure to stimulate the global economy at the scale of Lehman default crisis in September 2008 could see a further adjustment, in our view. What makes it harder for central banks this time around is that consumer confidence is affected by the fear of infection and death caused by COVID-19 which money cannot help alleviate. As a result, the failure to reassure public safety will make the QE or the fiscal stimulus package ineffective, in our judgment.
We are bracing for a global recession this year and expect volatility to persist for another 2 months as a result of pandemic conditions in the US and Europe. We do not believe risky assets should be accumulated at the time of this report on too many uncertainties. In the longer run, lower oil prices on Saudi-Russia conflict will benefit Asia as a net oil importer. We expect further spread widening for emerging markets bonds as defaults are expected to rise significantly.

A month after we pointed out the risk emanating from the new strain of a Corona virus (COVID-19) to the global economic recovery, the market still cannot fathom how bad this crisis will be. We were worried on the local outbreak outside China and here we are, the outbreaks in the US, Italy, France, Germany, Spain, and Iran; away from Asia where it all started.
Though we heard it could take anywhere from 12-18 months to develop the vaccine and the situation in China is improving, the situation in the western hemisphere is no nowhere near the peak. Assuming China has gone over the peak in 2 months (mid-January to mid-March) and it will take the western hemisphere and Iran to go over the peak in exactly the same duration, 2 months is a long time and anything can happen, in our view. Then after mid-May when the “carpet bombing” will have finished, we still need to re-assess the damage which could take months to know factually. The two unknowns are (1) how bad the infection would be in the US and Europe, given the level of unpreparedness, and (2) how much damage this virus will be on the global economy.
We are of the opinion that the damage will be very difficult to gauge as the proportion of the virus infection has never happened in recent history. We are of the opinion that COVID-19 fears will be here to stay until the vaccine is successfully developed. The return of COVID-19 in September after the summer in northern hemisphere cannot be ruled out.
We believe central banks are seeing what we see and will come out with more quantitative easing measures and fiscal stimulus in such a large scale, following the US Federal Reserve (Fed) and Bank of England’s recent 50-bp cut. A failure to stimulate the global economy at the scale of Lehman default crisis in September 2008 could see a further adjustment, in our view. What makes it harder for central banks this time around is that consumer confidence is affected by the fear of infection and death caused by COVID-19 which money cannot help alleviate. As a result, the failure to reassure public safety will make the QE or the fiscal stimulus package ineffective, in our judgment.
We are bracing for a global recession this year and expect volatility to persist for another 2 months as a result of pandemic conditions in the US and Europe. We do not believe risky assets should be accumulated at the time of this report on too many uncertainties. In the longer run, lower oil prices on Saudi-Russia conflict will benefit Asia as a net oil importer. We expect further spread widening for emerging markets bonds as defaults are expected to rise significantly.

'Quantamental' Japan Specialist, LightStream Research

Campbell Gunn

'Quantamental' Japan Specialist

ja research

ja research is an independent research platform focused exclusively on Japanese equities. Leveraging data and graphic analysis provided by Japan Analytics, we provide insights on small and medium-sized companies that have been ignored by the sell-side as well as challenging conventional wisdom on larger companies. We also offer analyst and corporate access, the latter with translation if required. 

<figure class="editor-figure mceNonEditable"><img src="https://static-prod.smartkarma.com/images/media/000/122/342/original/2020-03-11_11-02-32.png?1583892183" class="editor-image img-responsive" data-smartkarma-image-id="122342"></figure><figure class="editor-figure mceNonEditable"><img src="https://static-prod.smartkarma.com/images/media/000/122/590/original/2020-03-12_07-42-03.png?1583966536" class="editor-image img-responsive" data-smartkarma-image-id="122590"></figure><div class="content-caption">Source • Japan Analytics</div>CUMULATIVE CASH FLOWS - In this third and final of our series on Japanese companies that might be compromised as the Covid-19 recession unfolds,  we shall look at Cumulative Cash Flows. Our cash flow model is derived from the disclosed Balance Sheets and Statements of Comprehensive Income and balances to zero for every company for every comparable period. Variations in disclosure between the audited annual yuho and unaudited quarterly kessan tanshin reports, notably when the company is reporting under the weaker IFRS standard can result in unavoidable quarter-to-quarter variations. Consequently, our analysis will focus on year-on-year changes as of the most recent quarterly disclosure irrespective of fiscal year-end.  Our review will cover six principal cash flow metrics:-<ul>
<li>
Operating Cash Flow - Operating Cash Flow comprises all cash flow items relating to transactions with customers and suppliers except inventory cash flows.</li>
<li>
Investing Cash Flow - Investing Cash Flow comprises cash flow to or from Fixed Assets and Inventories. Unlike GAAP Cash Flows Statements, It does not include investments in financial assets.</li>
<li>
Inventory Cash Flow - A sub-set of Investing Cash Flow, inventory Cash Flow is the change in Inventory on the Balance Sheet. </li>
<li>
Free Cash Flow - Free Cash Flow the sum of Operating Cash Flow, Fixed Asset Cash Flow and Inventory Cash Flow.</li>
<li>
Financing Cash Flow - Financing Cash Flow comprises Debt &amp; Lease Liabilities, Investments and the taxation that is allocated to Financing Cash Flow. Debt &amp; Lease Liabilities includes changes in Short and Long-Term Debt and Lease Liabilities and Interest and Bond Issuance Expenses.' Investments' includes Interest &amp; Dividend Income, Purchases and Sales of Securities, Loans, Gains and Losses on Marketable Securities and Equity Earnings.</li>
<li>Change in Cash - Change in Cash is the sum of Free Cash Flow, Financing Cash Flow and Shareholder Cash Flow after including Minorities &amp; Adjustments. </li>
</ul>EXCLUDED - Four companies have been excluded from our review as they have substantial financial subsidiaries - <a href="https://www.smartkarma.com/entities/z-holdings-corp" target="_blank" data-smartkarma-citation="entities:19603:1" rel="noopener">Z Holdings (4689 JP)</a>, <a href="https://www.smartkarma.com/entities/rakuten-inc" target="_blank" data-smartkarma-citation="entities:31:1" rel="noopener">Rakuten (4755 JP)</a>, <a href="https://www.smartkarma.com/entities/sony-corp" target="_blank" data-smartkarma-citation="entities:563:1" rel="noopener">Sony (6758 JP)</a>, <a href="https://www.smartkarma.com/entities/japan-post-holdings-co-ltd" target="_blank" data-smartkarma-citation="entities:359:1" rel="noopener">Japan Post (6178 JP)</a> which distort their balance sheets. We have also excluded companies with a current market cap below ¥50b, although some exceptions have been made for abnormally large movements, such as those in <a href="https://www.smartkarma.com/entities/japan-display-inc" target="_blank" data-smartkarma-citation="entities:8280:1" rel="noopener">Japan Display (6740 JP).</a><a href="https://www.smartkarma.com/entities/toshiba-corp" target="_blank" data-smartkarma-citation="entities:637:1" rel="noopener">Toshiba (6502 JP)</a>-  As an example of our analysis, Toshiba has seen the largest reduction in Cash as a percentage of market value over the last twelve months of any large-cap Japanese company. Toshiba's cash balance has declined by ¥1.4 trillion since peaking in 2019-Q2 - 114% of the current market cap. 70% of the cash generated between 2018-Q4 and 2019-Q2 has been allocated to share repurchases, dividends and cash reduction. The company's net cash remains at a healthy 51% of market value and 43% of Shareholders' Equity; however, Cumulative Operating Cash Flow will fall below zero in the current quarter. There are few additional reductions in Fixed Assets and Inventories that can be sustained without irreparable damage. The logic of buying back shares in an entity that has negative residual returns is not clear to us. Despite the potential for a TOPIX re-inclusion 'bounce', fundamentally the stock should be avoided.<div class="content-highlight">In the DETAIL Section below, we shall look at the top (or bottom) thirty large-cap companies on each of the metric above scaled by market capitalisation. </div>

Source • Japan AnalyticsCUMULATIVE CASH FLOWS - In this third and final of our series on Japanese companies that might be compromised as the Covid-19 recession unfolds,  we shall look at Cumulative Cash Flows. Our cash flow model is derived from the disclosed Balance Sheets and Statements of Comprehensive Income and balances to zero for every company for every comparable period. Variations in disclosure between the audited annual yuho and unaudited quarterly kessan tanshin reports, notably when the company is reporting under the weaker IFRS standard can result in unavoidable quarter-to-quarter variations. Consequently, our analysis will focus on year-on-year changes as of the most recent quarterly disclosure irrespective of fiscal year-end.  Our review will cover six principal cash flow metrics:-

Operating Cash Flow - Operating Cash Flow comprises all cash flow items relating to transactions with customers and suppliers except inventory cash flows.

Investing Cash Flow - Investing Cash Flow comprises cash flow to or from Fixed Assets and Inventories. Unlike GAAP Cash Flows Statements, It does not include investments in financial assets.

Inventory Cash Flow - A sub-set of Investing Cash Flow, inventory Cash Flow is the change in Inventory on the Balance Sheet. 

Free Cash Flow - Free Cash Flow the sum of Operating Cash Flow, Fixed Asset Cash Flow and Inventory Cash Flow.

Financing Cash Flow - Financing Cash Flow comprises Debt &amp; Lease Liabilities, Investments and the taxation that is allocated to Financing Cash Flow. Debt &amp; Lease Liabilities includes changes in Short and Long-Term Debt and Lease Liabilities and Interest and Bond Issuance Expenses.' Investments' includes Interest &amp; Dividend Income, Purchases and Sales of Securities, Loans, Gains and Losses on Marketable Securities and Equity Earnings.
Change in Cash - Change in Cash is the sum of Free Cash Flow, Financing Cash Flow and Shareholder Cash Flow after including Minorities &amp; Adjustments. 
EXCLUDED - Four companies have been excluded from our review as they have substantial financial subsidiaries - Z Holdings (4689 JP), Rakuten (4755 JP), Sony (6758 JP), Japan Post (6178 JP) which distort their balance sheets. We have also excluded companies with a current market cap below ¥50b, although some exceptions have been made for abnormally large movements, such as those in Japan Display (6740 JP).Toshiba (6502 JP)-  As an example of our analysis, Toshiba has seen the largest reduction in Cash as a percentage of market value over the last twelve months of any large-cap Japanese company. Toshiba's cash balance has declined by ¥1.4 trillion since peaking in 2019-Q2 - 114% of the current market cap. 70% of the cash generated between 2018-Q4 and 2019-Q2 has been allocated to share repurchases, dividends and cash reduction. The company's net cash remains at a healthy 51% of market value and 43% of Shareholders' Equity; however, Cumulative Operating Cash Flow will fall below zero in the current quarter. There are few additional reductions in Fixed Assets and Inventories that can be sustained without irreparable damage. The logic of buying back shares in an entity that has negative residual returns is not clear to us. Despite the potential for a TOPIX re-inclusion 'bounce', fundamentally the stock should be avoided.In the DETAIL Section below, we shall look at the top (or bottom) thirty large-cap companies on each of the metric above scaled by market capitalisation. 

🇯🇵 JAPAN • Who’s Swimming Naked? > Part 3: Cumulative Cash Flow

Japan

Nippon Steel Corp is an integrated steel maker. The Company produces various types of steel products used for industrial machinery & equipment and exports them worldwide.  Nippon Steel provides plant construction and urban development and also develops new businesses such as chemicals, ceramics, electronic equipment and information & communication systems.

Price Gauge
52-week Range	0.00 - 0.00
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P/E	0.00
Dividend (Yield)	0.00

Nippon Steel Corporation (5401 JP)

JFE Holdings: Off to the Scrap Heap

Inflated profits, aged assets, negative cashflow JFE has been inflating profits by under depreciating and cashflow by underinvesting. In FY2019, it...

Bucephalus Research Partnership

JAPAN DELTA IV - Is The GPIF In Buying?

The GPIF is the world's largest pension fund at what was $1.6 trillion-plus at the end of December 2019. The management of the GPIF has made...

Travis Lundy

Shorts Jump as Markets Plunge

The short notional in the market for the data released 17 March is US$22.75bn (up by US$604mm excluding FX movements) with the largest short...

Brian Freitas

Market Monitor: Friday 13th Pandemic

A month after we pointed out the risk emanating from the new strain of a Corona virus (COVID-19) to the global economic recovery, the market still...

Bondcritic

🇯🇵 JAPAN • Who’s Swimming Naked? > Part 3: Cumulative Cash Flow

CUMULATIVE CASH FLOWS - In this third and final of our series on Japanese companies that might be compromised as the Covid-19 recession unfolds, ...

Campbell Gunn

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