Asean-focused. Ex-Head of Thai Research

Athaporn Arayasantiparb, CFA

Athaporn served as Head of Research for UOB and ANZ in Thailand and was an award-winning telecoms analyst at UBS in 2010 (AsiaMoney Thailand category) and Regional Strategist for DMG in Singapore. Prior to that, he also served as Kasikornbank credit analyst and scholar. He has a total work experience of 22 years, of which 19 were in research and 9 in research management roles. He started his career as an engineer for PTT and currently manages family investments. He holds an MBA from Stern (NYU) and CFA Charter since 2006.

Apart from IPO Radar, which focuses on future listings, MCorp Review also performs financial advisory services for TKC Services and provides 11 other on-going thematic series ranked by frequency in descending order, namely:

1) Snippets (news-driven);
2) Sathorn Series (financial services);
3) Silicon Stories (technology); 
4) Thai-Coons (billionaire origin series);
5) Reality Check (data-driven, investigative);
6) Thai Media Spotlight;
7) Political Pit Stop; 
8) Telecom Review; 
9) Thai Macro Watch (read-through from foreign events);  
10) Small Cap Diary; and
11) Property Grid

There are also 3 limited-time series driven by specific events or locations, namely:
1) Thai Corona Crisis;
2) South Series; and
3) Mechanics and Details (deal forensics).

TASCO: Surfing the Spread Uptrend in 2020

BEM: Leading Mass Transit Operator Is About to Get Huge

BTS: Solid Earnings Growth Momentum Remain

Homepro Struggles Against High Base Effects

IPO Stalker: DoHome Grows Profits Without Revenue Growth

Asean (Thailand) Focused Independent Research

M Corp Review

M Corp is led by Athaporn Arayasantiparb who served as Head of Research for UOB and ANZ in Thailand and was an award-winning telecoms analyst at UBS in 2010 (AsiaMoney Thailand category) and Regional Strategist for DMG in Singapore. Prior to that, he also served as Kasikornbank credit analyst and scholar. He has a total work experience of 17 years, of which 14 were in research and 4 in research management roles. He started his career as an engineer for PTT and currently manages family investments. He holds an MBA from Stern (NYU) and CFA Charter since 2006. Apart from IPO Radar, which focuses on future listings, MCorp Review also provides six on-going thematic series ranked by frequency in descending order, namely: 1) Silicon Stories (technology) 2) Sathorn Series (financial services) 3) Thai-Coons (billionaire origin stories) 4) Reality Check (data-driven, investigative) 5) Thai Media Spotlight; and 6) Thai Macro Watch (global market drivers).

Equity Bottom-Up

We met up with Tipco Asphalt and Homepro, the country's largest home furnishing store chain. This is the quick run-down:<ul>
<li>
TASCO reported huge profits of Bt712m in Q3'19 vs just Bt6m in Q3'19, largely due to a Bt450m insurance payment it received in the quarter for the fire that broke out in its Malaysian refinery.</li>
<li>
EBITDA also surged 75% during the period due to an abnormally strong demand in China, its biggest market. However, 2020 sales volumes are expected to decline slightly.</li>
<li>
Homepro's profits grew only 12.8% on the back of slow 3% revenue growth. Management blamed the weak economy and heavy rains.</li>
<li>It is difficult for Homepro to outperform DoHome, which we prefer, given their already large network and higher proportion of private labels. In addition, the larger stores take longer to break even.</li>
</ul>

We met up with Tipco Asphalt and Homepro, the country's largest home furnishing store chain. This is the quick run-down:

TASCO reported huge profits of Bt712m in Q3'19 vs just Bt6m in Q3'19, largely due to a Bt450m insurance payment it received in the quarter for the fire that broke out in its Malaysian refinery.

EBITDA also surged 75% during the period due to an abnormally strong demand in China, its biggest market. However, 2020 sales volumes are expected to decline slightly.

Homepro's profits grew only 12.8% on the back of slow 3% revenue growth. Management blamed the weak economy and heavy rains.
It is difficult for Homepro to outperform DoHome, which we prefer, given their already large network and higher proportion of private labels. In addition, the larger stores take longer to break even.


Tipco Asphalt

Tipco Asphalt’s Best Quarter