Daily Brief Equity Bottom-Up: Decoding Tata Motors Demerger: The Way Ahead and more

• Tata Motors restructures, separating passenger and commercial vehicle businesses into distinct entities to unlock value in electric vehicles and Jaguar Land Rover unit.
• Streamlines operations, enhances shareholder value, and capitalizes on growth opportunities in passenger and commercial vehicle sectors.
• Offers investors specialized entities, unlocking hidden value, showcasing proactive adaptation to market changes, and positioning for sustainable growth in the automotive industry.

• Sea (SE US) has completed a full cycle of growth followed by a phase of profitability improvements/cost-cutting.
• Although substantial cost reductions have been implemented, these efforts have mainly focused on fixed costs.
• With marketing efficiency unchanged and significant improvements in gross margin difficult, the company appears no closer to achieving stable profitability than it initially was.

• Sea Ltd (SE US) released 4Q2023 and FY2023 results with a full-year net profit but another loss in 4Q but QoQ improvements for e-commerce and digital financial services. 
• E-Commerce core market growth rates where impressive, with strong growth momentum with Brazil seeing large profitability gains, whilst overall Shopee is gaining share with the additional benefits from greater scale.  
• Digital Financial Services saw a significant uptick in its loan book and profitability, whilst management pointed toward 2H2024 profitability for Shopee. Management is pointing towards 2024 being another profitable year. 

• The current “higher for longer” interest rates in the US and other developed markets adds to the Bank of Japan potentially ending its negative interest rate policy
• Domestically, news reports suggest that the BoJ’s 2% inflation target is increasingly likely to be met in the short term, which further drives the potential normalization of interest rate policy
• Growing expectation of the BoJ’s negative interest rate policy exit adds upside to Japanese bank shares, especially those geared into higher domestic interest rates; we like Resona, Mizuho and Concordia

• Yesterday, Haidilao International Holding (6862 HK), the largest hotpot chain in China, announced that the company will introduce franchise model as a new way to support growth. 
• Haidilao’s move into franchising should directly benefit Yihai Int’L Holding (1579 HK), the affiliate company that supplies hotpot condiments to Haidilao. 
• Yihai is trading at an inexpensive 12x 2024 PE compared to a historical average of 32x since listing.

• Despite margin pressure, Sheng Siong (SSG SP) delivered resilient earnings for FY23. Revenue was up 2.3% YoY, and profits were up 0.3% YoY. 
• The company guided it had opened two additional stores at the start of 2024 (2023 end: 69), and six more locations were up for tender in 2024. 
• The stock trades at 17x FY23, with a 4% dividend yield and 15% of the market cap in cash. Margin pressure due to inflation will be a headwind in FY24. 

• VinFast is a fast-growing electric vehicle manufacturer based in Vietnam, founded in 2017 by Vingroup and billionaire Pham Nhat Vuong
• The company has plans for global expansion and aims to have vehicles in 50 markets by the end of 2024
• VinFast has a $16 billion market cap and recently completed a SPAC merger that raised $239 million, but its financial ties to Vingroup raise concerns about its independence

This content is sourced through publicly available sources and has been machine generated. Information displayed is for general informational purposes only. This article was originally published 3 months ago on Value Investors Club.

• TLNE announced the sale of Cumulus Data for a valuation higher than we were expecting and includes a long-term power purchasing agreement
• TLNE’s management has also mentioned an ongoing sales process for TLNE’s assets in Texas, which could generate additional value.
• TLNE sold Cumulus Data for $650 million to Amazon Web Services (“AWS”). TLNE sold the assets the Company had situated adjacent to Susquehanna nuclear power plant

The key feature of Primary Health Properties’ (PHP’s) 2023 results was the further acceleration in rental uplifts, rising at the fastest pace for 15 years. This is driving organic earnings growth to fully cover progressive dividends, which are now in the 28th year of unbroken increase.

• Wrkr Ltd (ASX:WRK) offers compliance solutions for Australian superannuation contributions and payroll including member onboarding, super payments, messaging and employee validation.
• WRK has reported a H1 FY24 adjusted EBITDA loss of $0.53m, half that of H1 FY23 and in line with RaaS estimates.
• The result benefitted from both operating leverage (43% revenue growth against a 6% increase in operating costs) and some reallocation of employee costs to capitalised product development.