Hey anon.. you got the balls to buy 40k?! - BTC VLOG #58Some big dumps here with the Evergrande news... when I called 53k lower high it generally indicates probability is with further downside but it in no way can that predict events like potential real estate fueled recession in China.
No oracle outside of insiders can predict that. All you can get are hints and probabilities in the TA.
40 to 41k seems bottom of this range, if you have the cajones, and I love these moments... how many times did we touch 30k? Did you have the balls to buy that 30k?!
You got the balls to buy this 40k?! What's your invalidation?
Buy low sell high, buy range low, sell at your targets. Not telling anybody to buy, not goading people with toxic masculinity, just saying that since I started this vlog, betting on these range lows is where so much money is made.
PREDICTION = We want to test the range low.
=== TimeStamps ===
0:00 = Welcome
0:30 = BTC 1 day
1:25 = SPX500 check
5:20 = Possible patterns
6:40 = Adjusting fibs
9:15 = Weak descending wedge
11:20 = Lower high has rewarded me
12:30 = We can get back to bullish
13:45 = NASDAQ
14:25 = BTC 1 weekly
14:45 = BTC 1 monthly
15:45 = ROUGH PREDICTION
16:45 = ... mother of god DESC TRI
19:30 = Closing words
------------------
NOT FINANCIAL ADVICE, please don't trade off solely my ideas. Always do your own TA and develop your own convictions.
China
NIO: to Boost Its Battery Swap Stations' Coverage Along HighwaysThe company also has 341 supercharging stations with 2,176 supercharging piles, 515 destination charging stations with 2,878 piles and access to more than 400,000+ third-party charging piles.
The Chinese Lunar New Year holiday is a peak travel time for the public, and NIO wants to significantly expand its battery swap stations' coverage along highways before then to make it easier for its customers to travel by car.
The electric vehicle company announced Tuesday that it will have a battery swap network covering eight major highways and four densely populated metropolitan areas by the Chinese New Year in 2022.
The next Chinese New Year will come on February 1, 2022, and no official schedule has been released, but the holiday is usually seven days.
The holiday is typically a time for people working in major cities to return to their hometowns and will also see one of the world's largest population migrations, although it has waned in size in recent years due to Covid-19 concerns.
According to NIO's plan, the company hopes to complete a battery swap network along five north-south highways and three east-west highways by then.
The five north-south highways are G1 Beijing-Harbin Expressway, G2 Beijing-Shanghai Expressway, G4 Beijing-Hong Kong-Macao Expressway, G5 Beijing-Kunming Expressway, and G15 Shenyang-Haikou Expressway.
The three east-west highways are the G30 Lianyungang-Horgos Expressway, the G50 Shanghai-Chongqing Expressway, and the G60 Shanghai-Kunming Expressway.
The four metropolitan areas the company hopes to cover are Beijing-Tianjin-Hebei, Yangtze River Delta, Guangdong-Hong Kong-Macao Greater Bay Area, and Chengdu-Chongqing.
William Li, founder, chairman and CEO of NIO, said Tuesday that the company's number of battery swap stations covering the highway now stands at 99 and will increase to 169 by the Chinese New Year.
Notably, NIO has previously built battery swap networks covering the G2 Beijing-Shanghai Expressway and the G4 Beijing-Hong Kong-Macao Expressway.
On September 20, the company announced the completion of its battery swap network covering the G1 Beijing-Harbin Expressway, making it the third fully connected expressway battery swap network.
The G1 Beijing-Harbin Expressway is 1,229 kilometers long, and NIO has provided 10 battery swap stations along its route, one every 120 kilometers on average.
In addition, NIO announced on September 16 that with three new battery swap stations in highway service areas in operation, it has completed its network of battery swap stations in highway service areas from Beijing to all major cities in the surrounding area.
The network consists of 12 highway battery swap stations, centered on Beijing, covering the service areas in Hebei and Tianjin on seven highways: Beijing-Chengde, Beijing-Harbin, Beijing-Lhasa, Beijing-Chongli, Beijing-Shanghai, Beijing-Hong Kong-Macau, and Beijing-Qinhuangdao.
According to CnEVPost database, as of September 21, NIO had 484 battery swap stations in China.
This article was first published by Phate Zhang on CnEVPost, a website focusing on new energy vehicle news from China.
For the full article with the charts, please visit the original link.
Cataclysms are brewing in the global stock markets. China.All because of the situation with one of the largest developers in China - China Evergrande Group, which found itself on the verge of default (debt size ~ $ 300 billion).
The possible bankruptcy of the company will hurt not only the Chinese economy (remember Lehman Brothers).
Deposits in Chinese banks are about to $35 trillion, which is twice the size of the United States. Chinese financial crisis will lead to unforeseen circumstances and will affect all world markets.
Industrial production has negative rates in China. Now it is near the lowest level since the global financial crisis.
The devaluation of the yuan seems inevitable.
Best regards EXCAVO
Evergrande Explained: What Does It All Mean For Markets?Evergrande is something that most of you will have heard about lately, and if you haven’t… you should get the know about it.
This has been one of the main causes of the latest sell off in markets. Its affecting all financial markets from the stock market to the crypto market right now.
I want to explain why that’s the case and what impact it might have going forward…
What is Evergrande?
For anyone who has never heard of Evergrande or maybe has heard it but isn’t sure what it is…
Evergrande is Chinas 2nd largest Real Estate developer and 122nd largest company in the world.
They employ over 120,000 people.
They have over 1,300 building projects in China.
And importantly, they also have some of the largest company debt in the world…
They owe approximately 300 BILLION dollars.
And can’t afford to pay it back…
So What Does It All Mean & Why Is This Important?
Evergrande defaulting on its debt payments has shaken confidence in Chinese real estate markets and caused investors to “de-risk” their portfolios…
Its caused volatility and market sell offs in the stock market as investors or lender to Evergrande are no doubt selling assets to cover some the capital now at risk of default with Evergrande.
Its also made investors worry about a wider spread debt crisis or “contagion” event in markets where lenders or debtors to Evergrande are then also at risk if those debts are not paid back.
So Whats Going To Happen?
So while we outline what this does mean for markets its important to also outline what it doesn’t mean… There are fears that this could be a similar event to the real estate crisis in the US around 2008 where Lehman Brothers defaulted on their debts… and we all know how that ended right?
Well I don’t think this is the same… and more importantly I don’t think that the Chinese authorities would allow that to happen.
This event in some ways has been caused by the Chinese authorities trying to calm the excesses they knew about in the Chinese real estate market…
So I believe this is somewhat a controlled explosion by authorities in China that are looking to deleverage their market excesses.
If that is the case then the fear in the market currently of contagion risks and full blown market crisis is over exaggerated. That means there’s a real possibility that this COULD offer an opportunity to get a good entry into the market during this pullback.
ChinaYesterday saw some significant moves in several key macro factors. The charts below detail the sharp escalation in China stress (at the national, rather than real estate sector specific level) & the impact that had on broader risk appetite in markets.
The Evergrande story has been in motion for months. Up until yesterday, contagion had been restricted to immediate peers – Chinese real estate / financial names, a few Australian miners.
What changed yesterday was the move in Chinese Credit Default Swaps (CDS). Sovereign CDS liquidity is poor but the signal is unmistakeable – markets moved this from an idiosyncratic story to one with potentially far broader ramifications.
For the first time in a while the risk off move had a material impact on the credit markets – "European financial" & "high yield" bonds especially. Again, our models suggest this is very much a statistical abnormality.
The spike in VIX was a significant move on Qi models. VXEEM, VDAX (implied volatility measures for emerging markets and the DAX respectively) & the gold/silver ratio experienced similar moves.
What next?
China is the epicentre of current market moves & your view on how the Evergrande story unfolds is critical. China bears will see these factor moves as a genuine re-pricing. If so, Qi can high-light those markets that are lagging versus the new environment.
In times of stress it is more important than ever to quantify relationships between asset price & the macro environment.
LOOK UP™
Navigating the Evergrande into the Chinese Golden WeekThe Evergrande FUD is spreading, fuelled by western media looking for another Lehman moment to cover. The people selling the news have no clue to what extent the CCP plunge protection team is mandated to go to protect the real estate prices. After all real estate is 80% of household wealth, and if retail hurts, Xi's image will be tarnished. To make things more pressing, China is going into a 10 day long hibernation starting the 1st of October, the Golden Week where most services including financial markets will be closed.
TSLA Short down to the 700.00 Level Overall I've been bullish on this stock however with the markets sentiments going bearish because of the news in China. I am looking at TSLA to hit the 700.00 level which lines up with a major QP zone. We could also see further bearish sentiment down to the 638.00 levels.
BTC-Predictable as alwaysGood Morning traders!
Yesterdays PA was easy to understand if you new what to look for.
Retail traders are PREDICTABLE and therefore the markets movements are.
The market has moved exactly as anticipated, sweeping out the retail orders stacked at the bottom of the range.
We are now currently sitting on the neckline of a large head and shoulders pattern. These patterns are subjective, and become "valid" once we break and close under the neckline. Again don't you think whales and funds know of these patterns....
From this point onwards I will be looking to enter longs, however I will be prepared that price can easily pull right back to the yellow circle around 37k.
The current market is being influenced by the spx500 and Evergrande, how it will play out is anyone's best guess, but I would suggest the Chinese government will stop a default to stop toxic debt seeping into the greater market.
As always trade safe
EnvisionEJ
HSBC Bearish OptionsFamous short seller Jim Chanos let people think in the last interview that he shorted some banks which are overexposed in China.
The bank had hired for about 400 client-facing roles for its mainland digital wealth planning venture and will have about 700 personal wealth planners on the ground by the end of 2021.
Looking at the puts today and the 22usd strike prices for 2021-10-15, i think that is the direction we are heading to!
Is Evergrande the next Lehman Brothers ??China`s economic model is based on real estate investment to drive growth. 20 Mil apartment buildings per year.
China`s residential property is 20% of GDP every year. Too much!
Real estate activities in China close to 30% of GDP every year. Huge!
Chinese Government is Bashing the private sector, look at GOTU and BABA for example.
Evergrande, second largest property developer in China has more than $300 billion in debt!
Evergrande has $83.5 million interest payment Sept. 23 and a $42.5 million payment on Sept. 29
Failure to to pay in 30 days can put Evergrande in default.
Today Evergrande has a Market Cap of 30.099B! At its peak, Evergrande was traded 13.5X higher!
Evergrande’s potential debt blowup can send shock waves through financial markets!
Today was just the beginning.
XPeng Says P5 Had 6,159 Orders in 24 Hours of Official LaunchThe company said that 54 percent of those orders were for the LiDAR-equipped models.
XPeng Motors said Friday that it accumulated 6,159 orders for its new sedan, the P5, in the first 24 hours of its official launch.
The company announced Wednesday evening Beijing time that the P5 became available for order in China in six configurations with a subsidized price range of CNY 157,900 (USD 24,500) to CNY 223,900, and deliveries will begin in late October.
XPeng said today that 90 percent of these new orders are for models that support XPILOT 3.5 and XPILOT 3.0, its autonomous driving assistance system.
It's worth noting that this does not mean that all of these customers are subscribed to the XPILOT system, as they will need to spend additional money. XPeng did not disclose the percentage of customers who subscribed to the service.
XPeng debuted a new naming scheme for the P5 model, with the P representing the model's highest level of intelligence, followed by the E and G. The numbers in the names of the different models represent their NEDC ranges.
The P series, with the highest intelligence rating, offers a choice of 550 km and 600 km NEDC ranges, while the E and G series both offer a choice of 460 km and 550 km ranges.
Among these models, only two models of the P series are equipped with LiDAR, priced at CNY 199,900 and 223,900 respectively.
They can allow users to pay for a subscription to XPILOT 3.5 at a standard price of CNY 45,000, and users will be able to enjoy a discounted price of CNY 25,000 if they subscribe before delivery.
The two E series models are priced at CNY 177,900 and CNY 192,900 respectively. They allow users to pay for a subscription to XPILOT 3.0 at a standard price of CNY 36,000, and users will be able to enjoy a discounted price of CNY 20,000 if they subscribe before delivery.
The two models of the G series are priced at CNY 157,900 and CNY 172,900 respectively and do not support the XPILOT system.
This article was first published by Phate Zhang on CnEVPost, a website focusing on new energy vehicle news from China.
Dada Nexus Beats Q2 2021 Earnings Estimates, Growth AcceleratesCreating extra value for JD.com's 530 million active users will be the company's next strategic endeavor.
With the tumultuous unfolding around China's major New York-listed tech companies, plenty of mid-cap stocks have been affected as well, losing their market value in 2021. In some cases, however, investors' fear has little to nothing to do with the firms' real fundamentals.
Dada Nexus (DADA:NASDAQ) may be one such company. The Chinese operator of on-demand delivery and retail platforms recently posted its Q2 2021 financials. This time, the key results slightly exceeded both the analyst consensus and the firm's own projections, showing a pro forma revenue growth of 81.3% (the revenue recognition model was changed in April) and CNY 549 million in net loss – the Street's average expectation was CNY 615 million.
Dada was founded in 2014 as an "open local on-demand delivery platform" and took its present form after a merger with JD.com's (JD:NASDAQ) spinoff JDDJ in 2016; since the completion of that deal, it has been developing around a duo of products, boosting the core services' scope and building adjacent businesses and partnerships. In June 2020, the firm went public on Nasdaq, raising funds vital to stay competitive in the ongoing battle for Chinese consumers.
A growth-stage company, Dada is scrambling for a larger market share while moving towards profitability. Throughout the June quarter, its expansion continued.
This article looks at the key indicators' dynamics to analyze Dada Now and JDDJ's performance within those three months. We first crunch the newly reported data, then calculate key ratios to track the progress in financials and unit economics. To top it off, we provide a glance at Dada's tech initiatives beyond the two platforms.
"JD's over 530 million users" and COVID-19
In the twelve months through June 2021, the number of JDDJ's active users reached 51.3 million, increasing by 58.8% year-on-year. Dada relates this growth, among other things, to its cooperation with JD.com. During the earnings call, the company's executives stated that it "continued to win customers' trust" and is going to proceed with the "in-depth cooperation with JD to better serve the omnichannel and on-demand needs of JD's over 530 million active users." In addition, a new tool is being constructed at the intersection of the two digital ecosystems: 'Fujin', the former's entry point within the latter's app, has been tested in a handful of cities, including Shenzhen and Shanghai.
The duet's convergence is happening amid a post-COVID boom in the Chinese on-demand retail market. The number of users in the space has lately skyrocketed and is projected (link in Chinese) to grow at a 31% CAGR from 2019 to 2023. Consumers have changed their shopping habits forever.
It's also crucial that despite the magnitude of new possible outbreaks in China, this trend will remain strong, as the fix-cost-burdened offline stores are embracing online traffic. And Dada is among the country's top platforms that drive brick-and-mortar players' online sales, accelerating their adoption of digital tools.
From the ESG perspective, COVID-19 has pushed Dada Group to shoulder more social responsibility. Its executives stated that the company had worked "closely with local governments to provide the daily supplies and the on-demand delivery for the customers," and, as a result, "received recognition from the government."
More merchants, new partners and categories
Users are just a part – although the most critical one – of the story. The supply-side matters as much. As per the company, this quarter, JDDJ made significant progress in category expansion.
In retrospect, Dada started its business with groceries and has now covered a number of areas, such as pharma and apparel. By now, it has been taking the lead in the supermarket category and seeking partnerships with big chains. By the end of Q2 2021, hands had been shaken between Dada and "80 chains out of China's top 100."
The most recent attempt in the consumer electronics arena was emphasized a couple of times in the investor conference. As on-demand retailing has gradually been recognized by smartphone manufacturers, Dada has partnered with hundreds of distributors and established cooperation with Apple and vivo, among other major brands. Besides, the company stepped further into the PC category, cooperating with Microsoft, Asus, Dell and Alienware, among others. In response to an analyst's question, the executives disclosed that the potential of some new categories, including home appliances and cosmetics, will be further explored.
User acquisition at full pelt
In Q2, Dada's total expenses have added to around CNY 2.21 billion. The sales and marketing cost grew from CNY 386 million in Q2 2020 to CNY 824 million in Q2 2021. According to the unaudited financial results, this boost was mainly driven by the rising "incentives given to JDDJ consumers" and "referral fees paid to retailer store staff and third parties" to attract new users to the platform. Considerable investment was also directed to R&D, showing the intention to build comprehensive tech products on top of the company's commercial network. (One is Haibo.)
The operations and support expenses reached CNY 1.14 billion, compared with CNY 1.10 billion in the same quarter of 2020. The rise in rider cost stemming from the increasing intra-city delivery order volume mainly contributed to the accretion of this category; but this was partially offset by the decrease of rider-related costs incurred by the last-mile delivery business model upgrade – "effective since April 2021, the cost of riders for last-mile delivery services has been directly paid through third-party companies instead of through the company."
Even though the company experienced massive revenue growth in Q2, the spending on market expansion has kept the net profit margin at low levels. On a sequential basis, though, Dada improved its net profit margin, thanks to the efficiency gain in operations and consumer incentives.
Unit economics steadily improving
Positive dynamics in absolute figures, be it revenue or user pool growth, are never enough to claim success for a pre-profit platform economy enterprise. Dada's key business ratios, nonetheless, show some progress, too.
The trailing-twelve-months (TTM) revenue of JDDJ jumped from CNY 1.10 billion in Q4 2019 to CNY 2.97 billion in Q2 2021. In the meantime, the number of the platform's new users has been growing steadily, from 24.4 million to 51.3 million, up by 110.2%. The average revenue per user (ARPU) thereby rose from CNY 45.20 to CNY 57.90.
Using Meituan's Q2 2019 number (53.6%) as a proxy for quarter-on-quarter user retention rate (as opposed to customer churn) and the only assumption in this analysis, we found that JDDJ's user base may not only grow on the TTM basis, but the speed might have been accelerating continuously over the past eight quarters, which was perhaps caused by the platform's significant word-of-mouth marketing potential and effective referral system.
New tech, no red flags
Reporting a financially solid three-month period, Dada announced a few other updates this time. For one thing, it included an extra 1,000 stores into SaaS Haibo's network. The company is also developing an open autonomous delivery operation system, enabling on-demand retail applications for various hardware providers. The system has been tested and reportedly adopted by JD's SEVEN FRESH and Yonghui Superstores.
Both projects are narratives to keep tabs on. Those are highly likely to become key differentiators in the upcoming maturity phase of the on-demand delivery and retail market.
Over the past quarters, Dada Nexus has been growing at high double digits; good fundamentals and a balanced tactical arsenal are set to protect its market position.
For the full article with the charts, please visit the original link.
long position < we are hold it for 6 - 12 monthPlatON, initiated and driven by the LatticeX Foundation, is a next-generation Internet infrastructure protocol based on the fundamental properties of blockchain and supported by the privacy-preserving computation network. “Computing interoperability” is its core feature. By building a computing system assembled by Verifiable Computation, Secure Multi-Party Computation, Zero-Knowledge Proof, Homomorphic Encryption and other cryptographic algorithms and blockchain technology, PlatON provides a public infrastructure in open source architecture for global artificial intelligence, distributed application developers, data providers and various organizations, communities and individuals with computing needs.
China, Evergrande, and how now?Although I had expectations for China (funds) previously, I still have good expectations. BUT something fundamentally has been changing, and it is still pushing downwards in consolidation. IF at all, the Evergrande debacle appears to be a spark in the trigger.
Looks like Lehman 2.0 for thsoe who still remember...
Looks more bearish than bullish to me IMHO... 70/30 at this point.
Just keeping an eye on this!
Pinduoduo: Stellar Performance Reinforces Industry PositionChina's largest e-commerce company is transforming its development strategy.
Pinduoduo turned losses into gains in the second quarter of 2021, defending its leading position in the Chinese e-commerce area with 849.9 million annual active buyers.
Pinduoduo mainly focuses on lower-tier cities' customers and follows a 'universal social welfare' way to expand its business.
Agricultural products and reinforcing networks among farmers and customers may become the next profit points for the company.
Dazzling financial results
On August 24, 2021, Pinduoduo (PDD: NASDAQ) held it's Q2 2021 earning call, showing rather impressive financial results. Its stock surged over 20% at the beginning of that trading day.
Pinduoduo turned losses into gains for the first time in the second quarter of 2021. In Q2 2021, the company achieved revenue of CNY 23.05 billion, up 89% year-on-year. Its operating profit reached nearly CNY 2 billion (with non-GAAP operating profit of CNY 3.19 billion), compared with an operating loss of CNY 1.64 billion. In the remarkable quarter, the company received gains (net income attributable to ordinary shareholders) of CNY 2.41 billion, which is a big move compared with a net loss of CNY 0.90 billion in the same quarter of 2020. The company's basic earnings per ADS increased to USD 0.30, and diluted EPS reached USD 0.27. At the same time, its annual active buyers reached 849.9 million as of June 30, 2021, and average monthly active users (MAUs) increased to 738.5 million, accounting for 87% of its annual active buyers, defending its leading position in China's e-commerce area.
Analyzing the financials, we found that Pinduoduo's cost control contributes the most to the result. Due to increased promotion and coupon expenses, the company's sales and marketing expenses only increased 14% to CNY 10.39 billion. In comparison, general and administrative costs only increased 10% to CNY 0.43 billion, compared with the same quarter in 2020. Its operating margin and the net margin reached a historical high in the past three years, accounting for 8.7% and 17.9%, respectively. Notably, its sales and marketing expenses ratio has been cut to 45%, compared with 81% and 73% for the same quarter in 2019 and 2020, showing its consistent cost control efforts.
When dissecting its revenue structure, we found online marketing services still act as the primary resource of its revenue, which reached CNY 18.08 billion, up 64% year-on-year. According to the earnings call, this was due to the continued increase in merchant activities while merchants are exploring new ways to engage with users. Meanwhile, revenues from transaction services reached CNY 3.01 billion, surging 164% year-on-year, owing to the fulfillment and services provided in the new Duo Duo Grocery platform. As for the revenues from merchandise sales, as a temporary way to meet user demand for specific products, the income from this section was CNY 1.96 billion.
Agriculture may become the key to its future
As one of the fastest-growing e-commerce companies globally, Pinduoduo has focused on lower-tier markets' consumption demand, becoming famous for value-for-money goods. Consumers can purchase products at a lower price as a group on its merchandise platform. In this way, consumers are allowed to share feedback regarding products on their social media accounts, further amplifying the advertising influence of the company at the same time. Pinduoduo only needed two years to gain CNY 100 billion GMV (in contrast, Ali Group and JD used five and ten years, respectively). The company went public on Nasdaq in July 2018. Then in March 2021, it became China's most prominent e-commerce giant in terms of MAU.
The company is infamous for some of its products' poor quality. Even though most of them are cheap, the quality is often worse than it's desired by consumers. To resolve this issue, here are two solutions: the company could build a higher quality sub-platform, or a more 'universal-type social welfare' platform, with which it can gather profit from a broader population. Pinduoduo chose the second one. In April 2019, the company launched a critical transformation, building the Duo Duo Farms platform to help farmers in China's impoverished counties create new online sales channels. In traditional ways, farmers sell primary products to dealers, and dealers trade themselves. When customers purchase the product, the price has been increased much higher than its cost, which harms both farmers and customers. Then, when PDD becomes the mediator, it connects farmers directly with consumers across the country and applies customer-to-manufactory (C2M) to help them build their brands, forming a win-win situation. By the end of 2020, the platform has helped over 1.13 million farmers to sell over 2.06 million tons of agricultural produce.
We think Pinduoduo's transformation had a positive impact on its business operations. Before 2020, Pinduoduo had adopted a low-cost publicity model to convert the advertising fees payable to the media into rewards for users who introduce new customers. However, at this stage, we believe that since user numbers are gradually approaching the ceiling (as over half of the people in China are Pinduoduo's users), the model of wildly attracting new customers may no longer be suitable for the company and is difficult to bring profit growth. Facts have also confirmed our idea that the growth rate of the company's MAUs has been gradually slowing down since 2019. So Pinduoduo turned its developing direction to retain its users and add more value instead of attracting more users. Focusing on China's most prominent supply side is a good strategy – after all, it is a blue ocean with few competitions.
Hence, we are optimistic about the long-term development of Pinduoduo and believe that its agricultural focus might generate new opportunities.
Valuation and bottom line
We used EV/revenue and P/B ratio to value the company. Considering that the company has been able to turn losses into profits and its competitors have much lower ratios, we decided to use the adjusted historical average method. From the chart, it is obvious that the ratio is at a low level, which we think is mainly caused by the regulation changes in China recently. Based on its current financial performance, momentum, and competitive landscape, we calculated that 13.5x EV/revenue and 17.5x P/BV is an appropriate valuation for Pinduoduo in 12 months, which corresponds to a target price of USD 141.52.
Key risks
1. Pinduoduo's largest risk comes from possible conflicts with registered merchants. The company provides a favorable discount at the expense of downtrodden platform merchants. Besides, the merchants are the primary resources that benefit most of Pinduoduo's promotion activities. Small-scale merchants find it difficult to survive on this platform. In the long run, we think it will lead to the weakness of the supply side and harm the whole platform.
2. Another risk is that the problem of low-quality products still exists. Since the Pinduoduo platform has more razor-thin margins than other platforms, many merchants chose to sell defective goods in Pinduoduo while selling better goods on Tmall and JD.com. We think it is not conducive to the original impression transformation of the company in the long term.
For the full article with the charts, please visit the original link.
XPeng Launches P5 Sedan with Starting Price around USD 24,500The company has secured a supply partnership with SK Innovation (SKI), a South Korean power battery supplier, which will provide it with high nickel-based Li-ion batteries with 80% nickel content.
After two months of pre-sales, XPeng Motors' new sedan, the P5, officially went on sale on September 15 at prices several thousand CNY lower than the pre-sale prices.
XPeng announced at a press conference on Wednesday that the P5 is immediately available for order in China in six configurations with a subsidized price range of CNY 157,900 (USD 24,500) to CNY 223,900, and deliveries will begin in late October.
The exact post-subsidy pricing for these models is as follows:
600P CNY 223,900
550P CNY 199,900
550E CNY 192,900
460E CNY 177,900
550G CNY 172,900
460G CNY 157,900
For comparison, XPeng's flagship sedan, the P7, has a starting price of CNY 229,900. The P5 went on pre-sale on July 17 with a price range of CNY 160,000 (USD 24,700) to CNY 230,000.
XPeng debuted a new naming scheme on the P5 model, with P representing the model's highest level of intelligence, followed by E and G. The numbers in the names of the different models represent their NEDC range.
The P series with the highest intelligence level offers 550 km and 600 km NEDC range options, while the E series and G series both offer 460 km and 550 km range options.
The battery for the 460 km range model is a lithium iron phosphate battery, while the 550 km and 600 km versions are ternary lithium batteries.
XPeng previously boasted that the P5 is the world's first LiDAR-equipped model, but it is worth noting that only the P Series is equipped with this component, while the E Series and G Series models are not equipped with LiDAR.
In terms of intelligent configuration, the P series comes with XPILOT 3.5 driver assistance system, the E series comes with XPILOT 3.0, while the G series does not offer this system.
The XPILOT 3.5 enables the extension of NGP (Navigation Guided Pilot) from highways to city roads.
The standard price of XPILOT 3.5 is CNY 45,000, and subscribers will be able to enjoy a limited-time discounted price of CNY 25,000 if they subscribe before delivery. The standard price for XPILOT 3.0 is CNY 36,000 and 20,000 if users subscribe before delivery.
The urban NGP will allow high precision navigation and assisted driving, adapted to China's challenging urban road conditions.
NGP will also be upgraded to NGP-L - a highway NGP with LiDAR - to enable safer and more capable assisted driving on China's highways and expressways, the company said.
XPeng's existing ACC and LCC systems will also be upgraded and enhanced to ACC-L and LCC-L status in P5, which incorporates LiDAR to enable P5 to identify congested vehicles earlier and stationary vehicles more accurately.
"With the P5, we have delivered a new level in sophistication and technological advancement for smart EVs in China, at a competitive price point," said He Xiaopeng, Chairman and CEO of XPeng.
"We believe this is an age of intelligence, and that intelligence will redefine mobility as a whole. Now we have made the best-in-class smart family sedan available at the CNY 200,000 price range, bringing some of the most advanced driver assistance functionality to China's vast and fast-growing middle-class consumer base," He said.
"We have drawn inspiration from customers' feedback, especially during the pandemic, and from the best models in the conventional family sedan and recreational vehicle (RV) class, while taking functionality and features to a whole new level," He added.
This article was first published by Phate Zhang on CnEVPost, a website focusing on new energy vehicle news from China.
Do Not Expect the Next Tencent or Alibaba to Come from ChinaAntitrust, reform in education, real estate and medical care policies, Common Prosperity... all of these show that China is undergoing earth-shaking change. These changes have brought large uncertainty, making many investors afraid to invest in Chinese projects and companies. However, over the next decade, China sure will become the world's largest economy. How to better understand the opportunities and risks of the Chinese market and deal with certainty and uncertainty is a crucial problem. EqualOcean launched a series of research, China's Future Investment Watch, hoping to provide clues for global investors.
It is said that one of the most regrettable decisions of Richard Li, PCCW chairman and son of Li Ka-Shing, was not investing in Tencent in 2000. Indeed, the Tencent-led 2C Internet giants, such as Alibaba, Baidu, DiDi, Meituan, and ByteDance, experienced a golden age from 2000 to 2014 and have an increasing influence in China, resembling FAANG (Facebook, Apple, Amazon, Netflix, and Google) in the United States. Some of the companies are now deeply rooted in Chinese life and help their investors make impressive gains. However, we believe that the investment logic of China has changed currently, and investors who plan to invest in China now or in the future should know the new logic behind recent events. We will display the changes in three aspects: political, economic, and people.
New tones in the Chinese political environment
First of all, we think the Chinese political environment has changed, especially in the past four years. Since the advent of 'Modern Times' in China, the Chinese have been adhering to a rising belief in 'Industry Salvation' – or the transformation of the whole country through industrial advances. Therefore, the Chinese government has been focusing on supporting the development of the traditional industrial business in the first decade of the 21st century to raise the country's manufacturing power and quickly improve its international competitiveness. At the same time, the Chinese government has been looking upon the Internet as a relatively inefficient investment environment, and Internet companies receive little support officially. Unable to receive domestic help, Internet companies have to turn to VC/PE in developed countries or even go for cross-border IPOs. Owing to the capital support from VC/PE in the developed market and the neglect of policies, the Internet industry has experienced a long period of 'barbaric' growth. Many companies have begun to stand out during this time, such as the well-known Alibaba, Baidu, and Tencent.
Finally, from about 2013 to 2014, the Chinese government realized the advent of the digital age and the importance of the Internet. However, as the Internet is an emerging industry for China and the development path of other countries is difficult to learn from, Chinese regulators have been paying attention to finding a balance between growth and structural optimization. Between 2013 to 2017, we believe that China paid more attention to the growth side of the Internet instead of setting restrictions to optimize the structure of the Internet industry. Many policies can testify to the point; in November 2014, during the First World Internet Conference, the Chinese premier, Keqiang Li, pointed out that the Internet is a new tool for the Mass Entrepreneurship and Innovation national strategy; in June 2015, the China Ministry of Industry and Information Technology (MIIT) issued a notice to lift foreign ownership restrictions in the e-commerce sector, while the China State Council issued guidance to encourage the development of cross-border e-commerce companies simultaneously.
However, since late 2017, the Chinese government has changed its focus to acting as the Internet's support in terms of industrial (and technology) and legal compliance for Internet-related companies (the structural optimization side). Since November 2017, the policy document issuance has evolved to combine Internet concepts with general industrial and put forward concepts of 'Internet plus Advanced Manufacturing and Industrial Internet'; these were still being emphasized in official documents up to 2021. At the same time, the 2020 Central Economic Work Conference proposed 'strengthening antitrust and preventing disorderly capital expansion' as one of the key tasks in 2021. In December 2020, Alibaba, Tencent, and Hive Box Technology were punished, and the State Administration of market supervision also investigated Alibaba for creating a suspected monopoly. In March 2021, the State Administration of market supervision made administrative punishment decisions targeting many Internet giants, including Alibaba, Tencent, JD.COM, ByteDance, and Meituan.
In general, the emergence of large Internet companies such as Tencent and Alibaba was largely due to the neglect and laissez-faire of national policies from 2000 to 2013. More importantly, the neglect of policies has led to chaos in the industry, such as unfair competition, 996 culture, and P2P lending scams. With the endless emergence of reform policies, Internet companies have gradually recovered from the 'barbaric' growth stage to arrive at a relatively normal growth stage.
GDP growth driver becoming ineffective in the next decade
Second, the growth pattern of Chinese GDP in the past two decades is also a driver. In economics, GDP is defined as: GDP = Consumption + Investment + Government Spending + Net Exports (GDP = C + I + G + NX). After China joined the WTO in 2001, for a long time, China's economic growth mainly depended on official investment and trade surplus. Relying on the whole industrial chain system and developed light industry, China ushered in seven years of high GDP growth from 2001 to 2007.
However, such a growth mode is criticized by other economies because it relies too much on the I and NX. High net export indicates a high dependence upon foreign trade, and the excessive investment made by governments causes serious overcapacity, resources wasting, and environmental damage. These are the problems currently being solved by China, which proposes to increase the proportion of consumption-driven growth (which is much higher in developed countries). The slowdown of economic growth is one of the consequences. This is also the main reason why China has asked for speed reduction in recent years. Besides, China's economy grew into the world's second-largest economy one decade ago. It is difficult to maintain a high growth rate with such a large GDP base. Then from 2007, the GDP growth showed a downtrend.
We believe that the GDP growth rate change is an important reason for the rapid expansion of Internet companies from a valuation standpoint. As we all know, Discounted cash flow method (DCF) is often used by fund managers as an absolute valuation tool. One of the important parameters is the terminal growth rate, and the countries' GDP growth rate is used as the reference for this rate. The decline in terminal growth rate means an increase in valuation, even if the companies' operating remains consistent. We mentioned that China's GDP growth rate has been declining since 2007, which means that downward GDP boosted Internet companies' valuation, especially overseas-listed companies. We believe that this indirectly accelerates the development of Internet giants.
Nevertheless, we think GDP growth has stabilized within 5% to 6% level since the pandemic 2020, and China also said that it no longer pays attention to growth figures. We believe that in the past, the driving effect of downward GDP growth has gradually disappeared. The valuation of the Internet industry is gradually returning to rationality and it is difficult to reproduce the explosive growth.
From the 2C era to the 2B era
Third, To-Consumer (2C) companies' losing of competitive advantage is also a factor behind the change of the investing logic. In the past two decades, the most well-known players have been all the 2C companies. Such companies mainly gain profit from individual consumers, either directly (self-operated e-commerce and individual services) or indirectly (advertising and commission). Before 2017, the vast majority of Internet companies actually growth along with growing traffic. In other words, part of the company's growth came from the growth of customers and Chinese Internet users.
However, with the number of Chinese Internet users reaching the ceiling (the growth rate of 2C companies' customers is slowed down). The companies that were previously relying on user growth need to change their strategies in order to achieve further development. Therefore, many companies have chosen the road of horizontal development, accelerating financing acquisition and marching other industries. There are many temporary winners, such as Tencent and Alibaba.
Though it seems like the only way they can take when user bases reaching the ceiling (The penetration rate has grown to over 70%, as chart shows), we do not think all horizontal development 2C companies will succeed because it is hard for such companies to maintain their existing advantages in such a way. Hainan Airlines (HNA) is a bad example. In 2003, HNA began to implement diversified strategic transformation – that is, a horizontal development strategy. After the crisis in 2008, HNA began to accelerate overseas acquisitions. From a single local air transportation enterprise, it has developed into a giant operating in dozens of industries such as air travel, modern logistics, science, and technology. In its heyday, the company had assets of up to CNY 2.5 trillion, ranking 170 in the world, and owned the equity of many well-known companies, such as Hilton Hotels, Deutsche Bank, and Virgin Australia. However, the company's horizontal development over the years has brought high liabilities and serious liquidity problems, even default problems. Finally, in January 2021, the HNA Group went bankrupt. Except for HNA, many other giants also suffer from the same problems, such as Wanda Group and Anbang Group. Based on all these events, we think 2C will find it hard to maintain its previous high growth in the next decade, beginning in 2021.
In contrast, To-Business (2B) companies do not charge from individual customers and do not rely on the traffic-oriented business model. A significant reason why investors did not favor 2B companies before 2017 is that s2Cks prices rose slowly, which was not in line with the rapid capital increase desired by Chinese and foreign VC/PE. However, when the growth of 2C companies slows down, the values of 2B companies may become understood. We believe that 2B companies will become a new direction for China's development in the future. In other words, it is not easy to see such fast-growing 2C companies as Pinduoduo in China in the next decade.
Heading toward a semi-developed market
In conclusion, on the one hand, we believe that the standardization of policies, the decline of economic growth, and Internet users' situations all indicate the development phase of China: the Chinese market is switching from an emerging market to a semi-developed market. Moreover, based on observation of the macro and micro levels, we believe that this trend is happening rapidly and irreversibly.
On the other hand, we believe that China is learning lessons from Germany now rather than the United States. Germany has many hidden world champions in different micro-sectors, such as Hauni Maschinenbau and JF Hillebrand. This is also in line with China's Specialization, Refinement, Differentiation, Innovation of SMB strategy – that is, to support technically advanced small and medium-sized companies who focus on specific markets, rather than diversify giants that covering many different businesses such as Alibaba and Tencent.
Bottom line
For investors, based on the above analysis, we still firmly believe that China is a market worthy of investment. However, the logic of investing in China has changed, and small and medium-sized Chinese companies with core technology (potential invisible world champions) may become high-quality investment targets in the future.
XPeng Says Its Supercharging Stations Reach 400XPeng expects to expand its supercharging stations to dozens of cities, including Taiyuan, Tangshan, Nantong and Luoyang, within the next three months.
XPeng Motors said Tuesday it put 102 new supercharging stations into operation in August, bringing the total to 400, covering 101 cities in China.
Sixteen of those superchargers are located in highway service areas, bringing it to 27 superchargers in highway service areas, XPeng said.
The company added 36 new destination charging stations in August, bringing the total to 81, it said.
To date, the total number of XPeng-branded supercharging stations and third-party supercharging stations where users can enjoy a certain amount of free charging benefits is 1,596, the company said.
In comparison, XPeng's local counterpart NIO put 87 new battery swap stations into operation in August. It also added 56 supercharging stations and 73 destination charging stations in August.
In addition, NIO added one NIO House, 13 NIO Spaces, and three NIO Service Centers in August.
As of September 13, NIO had 445 battery swap stations, 300 fast charging stations, and 502 destination charging stations, according to CnEVPost database.
XPeng announced on July 12 that it is reducing the free charging allowance of 3,000 kWh per year offered to subscribers to 1,000 kWh per year as of August 1.
As XPeng customers continue to expand, the reduction in the free charging allowance is to ensure that the XPeng supercharging system can provide better and sustainable replenishment services to customers, the company explained, as quoted by sznews.com.
This article was first published by Phate Zhang on CnEVPost, a website focusing on new energy vehicle news from China.
Li Auto, XPeng, NIO Top Insurance RegistrationsThe NEV sales volume accounted for 17% of total new car sales in the month.
Li Auto had the highest number of insurance registrations among China's new car makers in August, with 9,394 units, according to a table released Saturday by Sina Auto based on data from the China Automotive Technology and Research Center (CATARC).
XPeng Motors came in second, with 6,945 insurance registrations in August, followed by NIO with 6,476.
Earlier this month, Li Auto released figures showing it delivered a record 9,433 Li ONEs, the company's only model, in August, up 248 percent year-over-year and up 9.8 percent from July.
XPeng said it delivered 7,214 vehicles in August, up 172 percent year-over-year but down 10 percent from July.
NIO said it delivered 5,880 vehicles in August, up 48 percent year-over-year and down about 26 percent from July.
The CATARC figures are based on insurance registrations for vehicles and are closer to true retail sales each month, as vehicles must have insurance in place and in effect before they can be licensed.
Neta Automobile ranked fourth with 6,038 insurance registrations in August. The company previously said it delivered 6,613 vehicles in August.
Leap Motor ranked fifth with 4,777 insurance registrations in August. The company previously said it delivered 4,488 vehicles in August.
WM Motor had 3,144 insurance registrations in August, the CATARC data show. It has not yet released sales figures for August.
Arcfox, the BAIC-owned EV brand, had 856 insurance registrations in August, compared with 642 for Seres, which sells cars in partnership with Huawei, 469 for HiPhi and 408 for Dongfeng Motor's premium EV brand Voyah.
This article was first published by Phate Zhang on CnEVPost, a website focusing on new energy vehicle news from China.
Tesla Hikes Model Y Performance Price in China by USD 1,550The company's CEO Elon Musk said to roll out an entry model in 2023.
Tesla announced on Weibo on Saturday that the starting price of the Model Y Performance in China has been raised by CNY 10,000 (USD 1,550) to CNY 387,900, with those who have previously reserved unaffected.
The Securities Times quoted a Tesla China public relations source as saying that the price increase was mainly due to fluctuations in manufacturing costs.
On January 1, Tesla announced the official launch of the China-made Model Y and the new Model 3. The Model Y Performance starts at CNY 369,900, down by CNY 165,100 from the previous price of CNY 535,000.
The Model Y Performance has not been delivered, and Tesla's website previously showed the version was expected to begin deliveries in the third quarter of 2021. After Tesla raised the price today, the website shows deliveries are expected to begin in the fourth quarter.
In May, the price of the Model Y Performance was raised from CNY 369,900 to CNY 377,900, and in August, the model went from pre-sale "pending regulatory approval" status to on-sale status.
The China-made Model Y Standard Range and Long Range versions remain unchanged at CNY 276,000 and CNY 347,900 respectively.
Interestingly, a Chinese Tesla owner said on social media Friday that his Model Y received a push from Tesla about a software package to improve acceleration performance.
The updated information shows that the owner can shorten the vehicle's 0-100 km/h acceleration time from 5 seconds to 4.4 seconds by paying CNY 14,100 (USD 2,190).
The owner did not specify which version of his Model Y is, but this should be the long-range version with dual-motor all-wheel drive, as Information on Tesla's website shows that only that version has a 0-100 km/h acceleration time of 5 seconds.
In comparison, the Model Y Performance has a 0-100 km/h acceleration time of 3.7 seconds.
This article was first published by Phate Zhang on CnEVPost, a website focusing on new energy vehicle news from China.