Korea/Asia, Events, IPOs, Douglas Research Advisory

Douglas Kim

Korea/Asia, Events, IPOs

Equity Capital Markets

<p><a href="https://www.smartkarma.com/entities/gaeasoft" target="_blank" data-smartkarma-citation="entities:12164:1" rel="noopener">Gaeasoft (051160 KS)</a> is a very interesting small cap stock in Korea that is worth further study. Gaeasoft currently has a market cap of 351 billion won. Gaesoft owns a 79.4% in a private company called Oasis Corp ("Oasis Market"), which operates an e-commerce platform for eco-friendly organic food products. In early July, <a href="https://www.kedglobal.com/newsView/ked202107070008" target="_blank" rel="noopener">Oasis Corp</a> received a 50 billion won investment from a private equity firm called Unison Capital, which put the valuation of the company at 750 billion won, up from the valuation of 315 billion won Oasis Corp received in March 2021.</p><div class="content-highlight">
<p><strong>In our view, the value of Oasis Corp is likely to increase to nearly 1.5 trillion won over the next 12 months, doubling in the valuation from July 2021. If Oasis Corp is valued at 1.5 trillion won, a 79.4% stake would be worth 1.2 trillion won, which would be 239% higher than Gaesoft's market cap. </strong></p>
<p>Oasis Corp's major competitors include SSG.com, Kurly, and Coupang. Similar to its competitors, Oasis Corp has experienced strong growth in sales. Unlike its competitors, Oasis Corp is already profitable. </p>
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Gaeasoft (051160 KS) is a very interesting small cap stock in Korea that is worth further study. Gaeasoft currently has a market cap of 351 billion won. Gaesoft owns a 79.4% in a private company called Oasis Corp ("Oasis Market"), which operates an e-commerce platform for eco-friendly organic food products. In early July, Oasis Corp received a 50 billion won investment from a private equity firm called Unison Capital, which put the valuation of the company at 750 billion won, up from the valuation of 315 billion won Oasis Corp received in March 2021.
In our view, the value of Oasis Corp is likely to increase to nearly 1.5 trillion won over the next 12 months, doubling in the valuation from July 2021. If Oasis Corp is valued at 1.5 trillion won, a 79.4% stake would be worth 1.2 trillion won, which would be 239% higher than Gaesoft's market cap. 
Oasis Corp's major competitors include SSG.com, Kurly, and Coupang. Similar to its competitors, Oasis Corp has experienced strong growth in sales. Unlike its competitors, Oasis Corp is already profitable. 


Korea Small Cap Gem #10: Gaeasoft - Its Stake in Oasis May Be At Least 200% Higher Than Its Mkt Cap

Korea / Special Situations, Clepsydra Capital

Sanghyun Park

Korea / Special Situations

Korea / Special Sits, Pairs, Index Rebalancing

Clepsydra Capital

Investigate special situations, pairs, and index rebalancing trades in Korea.

Event-Driven

<p>The Fair Trade Commission has warned that it will intensively monitor the abuse of such big techs as Coupang, Naver, and Kakao. In particular, the Fair Trade Commission pointed out that these big techs are unfairly selling their own products/services by manipulating search algorithms on their platforms.</p><p>This was directly mentioned by Cho Sung-wook, chairman of the Fair Trade Commission. Chairman Cho Seong-wook mentioned at the European Chamber of Commerce in Korea breakfast meeting on Friday that the FTC's top priority for the second half of this year would be regulating local big tech platforms.</p><section class="figure"><figure class="editor-figure mceNonEditable"><img src="https://static-prod.smartkarma.com/images/media/000/229/193/original/Screen+Shot+2021-09-10+at+11.37.01+PM.png?1631331436" class="editor-image img-responsive" data-smartkarma-image-id="229193"></figure></section><div class="content-caption">(Courtesy Dong-A Ilbo)</div><div class="content-highlight"><p><a href="https://www.donga.com/news/Economy/article/all/20210911/109199629/1" target="_blank" rel="noopener">Here is the link to the news article by Dong-A Ilbo about this matter.</a></p></div><p>In addition, Kim Jae-shin, vice-chairman of the Fair Trade Commission, pointed out that “the possibility of platform operators manipulating the search algorithm in a way that is advantageous to them cannot be ruled out.” He also said, "The FTC will strictly respond to the platform operators' act of adjusting and distorting the rules to give preference to their products and services."</p><p>The following remarks from vice-chairman Kim are critical. He directly mentioned Coupang and Naver as examples of search algorithm manipulation. In fact, Coupang has been under investigation by the Fair Trade Commission since July on charges of manipulating the search algorithm to expose its own brand (PB) products before the products of 3rd-party sellers.</p><section class="figure"><figure class="editor-figure mceNonEditable"><img src="https://static-prod.smartkarma.com/images/media/000/229/199/original/Screen+Shot+2021-09-10+at+11.46.40+PM.png?1631332146" class="editor-image img-responsive" data-smartkarma-image-id="229199"></figure></section><div class="content-caption">(Courtesy Dong-A Ilbo)</div>

The Fair Trade Commission has warned that it will intensively monitor the abuse of such big techs as Coupang, Naver, and Kakao. In particular, the Fair Trade Commission pointed out that these big techs are unfairly selling their own products/services by manipulating search algorithms on their platforms.This was directly mentioned by Cho Sung-wook, chairman of the Fair Trade Commission. Chairman Cho Seong-wook mentioned at the European Chamber of Commerce in Korea breakfast meeting on Friday that the FTC's top priority for the second half of this year would be regulating local big tech platforms.(Courtesy Dong-A Ilbo)Here is the link to the news article by Dong-A Ilbo about this matter.In addition, Kim Jae-shin, vice-chairman of the Fair Trade Commission, pointed out that “the possibility of platform operators manipulating the search algorithm in a way that is advantageous to them cannot be ruled out.” He also said, "The FTC will strictly respond to the platform operators' act of adjusting and distorting the rules to give preference to their products and services."The following remarks from vice-chairman Kim are critical. He directly mentioned Coupang and Naver as examples of search algorithm manipulation. In fact, Coupang has been under investigation by the Fair Trade Commission since July on charges of manipulating the search algorithm to expose its own brand (PB) products before the products of 3rd-party sellers.(Courtesy Dong-A Ilbo)

Korea FTC Says It Will Regulate Coupang on Search Algorithm Manipulation

Head of Research, IPOs & Placements, Aequitas Research

Sumeet Singh

Head of Research, IPOs & Placements

IPOs and Placements coverage across Asia Pacific

Aequitas Research

We cover all listing across the Asia Pacific along with follow-up placements. As of Dec 2020, our team had covered 539 IPOs with a hit rate of 73.5% and 685 placements with a hit rate of 66.8%.

We combine fundamental bottom-up views with our proprietary quantitative framework to provide a holistic coverage across new listings and placements. Our coverage includes pre-IPO notes before the deal is launched, follow-up analysis once the deal is live and post-listing trading analysis as well.

<div><p>Kakao Pay (KP), one of South Korea’s largest payment and financial services apps, aims to raise up to US$1.3bn in its South Korean IPO. Kakao held a 55% stake prior to listing, with Ant Financial holding the balance 45% stake.</p></div><div><p>As of 1H21, KP had a total of 36m users and around 20m monthly active users (MAU). It processed a total GMV of KRW66.9tn in 2020 and it had already generated KRW47.9tn GMV in 1H21 itself. As of the end of 1H21, it had dealings with more than 610,000 affiliated stores and 100 financial institutions.</p></div><div><p>Since spinning out from Kakao in 2017, the number of MAUs have grown 14x from 2Q17 to 2Q21, while the quarterly transaction amount grew 61x from KRW0.4tn in 2Q17 to KRW24.5tn in 2Q21. </p></div><div><p>Over the past few years the company has been expanding its offering beyond payment processing to include other financial products. On the back of this, its revenue has been growing faster than its GMV.</p></div><div>
<p>We have covered most aspects of the deal in our earlier notes, <a href="https://www.smartkarma.com/insights/kakao-pay-ipo-guided-by-ant-financial-to-be-a-mini-ant" target="_blank" rel="noopener">Kakao Pay IPO - Guided by Ant Financial to be a mini Ant </a>and  <a href="https://www.smartkarma.com/insights/kakao-pay-ipo-peer-comparison-local-and-international" target="_blank" rel="noopener">Kakao Pay IPO - Peer comparison - local and international</a>.</p>
<p>In this note we will talk about valuations and the latest announcement by the regulators.</p>
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Kakao Pay (KP), one of South Korea’s largest payment and financial services apps, aims to raise up to US$1.3bn in its South Korean IPO. Kakao held a 55% stake prior to listing, with Ant Financial holding the balance 45% stake.As of 1H21, KP had a total of 36m users and around 20m monthly active users (MAU). It processed a total GMV of KRW66.9tn in 2020 and it had already generated KRW47.9tn GMV in 1H21 itself. As of the end of 1H21, it had dealings with more than 610,000 affiliated stores and 100 financial institutions.Since spinning out from Kakao in 2017, the number of MAUs have grown 14x from 2Q17 to 2Q21, while the quarterly transaction amount grew 61x from KRW0.4tn in 2Q17 to KRW24.5tn in 2Q21. Over the past few years the company has been expanding its offering beyond payment processing to include other financial products. On the back of this, its revenue has been growing faster than its GMV.
We have covered most aspects of the deal in our earlier notes, Kakao Pay IPO - Guided by Ant Financial to be a mini Ant and  Kakao Pay IPO - Peer comparison - local and international.
In this note we will talk about valuations and the latest announcement by the regulators.


Kakao Pay IPO - Valuation and Likely Impact of Latest Announcement

<p>Kakao Pay (KP), one of South Korea’s largest payment and financial services apps, aims to raise up to US$1.3bn in its South Korean IPO. Kakao held a 55% stake prior to listing, with Ant Financial holding the balance 45% stake.</p><p>As of 1H21, KP had a total of 36m users and around 20m monthly active users (MAU). It processed a total GMV of KRW66.9tn in 2020 and it had already generated KRW47.9tn GMV in 1H21 itself. As of the end of 1H21, it had dealings with more than 610,000 affiliated stores and 100 financial institutions.</p><p>Since spinning out from Kakao in 2017, the number of MAUs have grown 14x from 2Q17 to 2Q21, while the quarterly transaction amount grew 61x from KRW0.4tn in 2Q17 to KRW24.5tn in 2Q21. </p><p>Over the past few years the company has been expanding its offering beyond payment processing to include other financial products. On the back of this, its revenue has been growing faster than its GMV.</p><p>We have covered most aspects of the deal in our earlier note, <a href="https://www.smartkarma.com/insights/kakao-pay-ipo-guided-by-ant-financial-to-be-a-mini-ant" target="_blank" rel="noopener">Kakao Pay IPO - Guided by Ant Financial to be a mini Ant</a>.</p><p>In this note we will undertake a peer comparison.</p>

Kakao Pay (KP), one of South Korea’s largest payment and financial services apps, aims to raise up to US$1.3bn in its South Korean IPO. Kakao held a 55% stake prior to listing, with Ant Financial holding the balance 45% stake.As of 1H21, KP had a total of 36m users and around 20m monthly active users (MAU). It processed a total GMV of KRW66.9tn in 2020 and it had already generated KRW47.9tn GMV in 1H21 itself. As of the end of 1H21, it had dealings with more than 610,000 affiliated stores and 100 financial institutions.Since spinning out from Kakao in 2017, the number of MAUs have grown 14x from 2Q17 to 2Q21, while the quarterly transaction amount grew 61x from KRW0.4tn in 2Q17 to KRW24.5tn in 2Q21. Over the past few years the company has been expanding its offering beyond payment processing to include other financial products. On the back of this, its revenue has been growing faster than its GMV.We have covered most aspects of the deal in our earlier note, Kakao Pay IPO - Guided by Ant Financial to be a mini Ant.In this note we will undertake a peer comparison.

Kakao Pay IPO - Peer Comparison - Local and International

<p>In this insight, we discuss the combination of the end of the lock-up period for Coupang on September 7th and the start of the Amazon Global Store Korea will likely to put further negative pressures on <a href="https://www.smartkarma.com/entities/coupang-inc" target="_blank" data-smartkarma-citation="entities:28425:1" rel="noopener">Coupang (CPNG US)</a>'s shares in the coming days. Starting September 7th, there is a whopping <strong>83% of outstanding shares</strong> that could be sold due to the end of the lock-down period.</p>
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<p>In our view, Softbank may try to sell as much of $3 billion in Coupang shares over the next 6-12 months, which represents nearly 5.8% of current market cap. We do believe that Softbank will try to recoup at least its original investment of nearly $3 billion.</p>
<p>A $3 billion investment is a big amount of money.<strong> If we assume a 30% per annum ROI required by Softbank (taking into consideration the time value of money of the two investments made in 2015 and 2018), this means that AT MINIMUM, Coupang's market cap would need to be $28 billion (which would suggest $16 per share).</strong> <em>At $16 per share, this would represent a further 46% lower levels than the current price of $29.65.</em></p>
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In this insight, we discuss the combination of the end of the lock-up period for Coupang on September 7th and the start of the Amazon Global Store Korea will likely to put further negative pressures on Coupang (CPNG US)'s shares in the coming days. Starting September 7th, there is a whopping 83% of outstanding shares that could be sold due to the end of the lock-down period.

In our view, Softbank may try to sell as much of $3 billion in Coupang shares over the next 6-12 months, which represents nearly 5.8% of current market cap. We do believe that Softbank will try to recoup at least its original investment of nearly $3 billion.
A $3 billion investment is a big amount of money. If we assume a 30% per annum ROI required by Softbank (taking into consideration the time value of money of the two investments made in 2015 and 2018), this means that AT MINIMUM, Coupang's market cap would need to be $28 billion (which would suggest $16 per share). At $16 per share, this would represent a further 46% lower levels than the current price of $29.65.


End of Lock Up Period + Start of Amazon Global Store Korea = Lower Share Price Likely for Coupang

South Korea

Coupang, Inc. operates as an e-commerce company. The Company offers dynamic end-to-end e-commerce and logistic solutions. Coupang serves customers worldwide.

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Coupang (CPNG US)

Korea Small Cap Gem #10: Gaeasoft - Its Stake in Oasis May Be At Least 200% Higher Than Its Mkt Cap

Gaeasoft (051160 KS) owns a 79.4% in a private company called Oasis Corp which operates an e-commerce platform for eco-friendly, organic food...

Douglas Kim

Korea FTC Says It Will Regulate Coupang on Search Algorithm Manipulation

The FTC has warned that it will intensively monitor the abuse of such big techs as Coupang for their search algorithm manipulation. We should use...

Sanghyun Park

Kakao Pay IPO - Valuation and Likely Impact of Latest Announcement

Kakao Pay, one of South Korea’s largest payment and financial services apps, aims to raise up to US$1.3bn in its South Korean IPO. Kakao held a 55%...

Sumeet Singh

Kakao Pay IPO - Peer Comparison - Local and International

Kakao Pay, one of South Korea’s largest payment apps, aims to raise up to US$1.3bn in its South Korean IPO. Kakao held a 55% stake prior to...

Sumeet Singh

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52-week Range

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Korea Small Cap Gem #10: Gaeasoft - Its Stake in Oasis May Be At Least 200% Higher Than Its Mkt Cap

Gaeasoft (051160 KS) owns a 79.4% in a private company called Oasis Corp which operates an e-commerce platform for eco-friendly, organic food...

Douglas Kim

Korea FTC Says It Will Regulate Coupang on Search Algorithm Manipulation

The FTC has warned that it will intensively monitor the abuse of such big techs as Coupang for their search algorithm manipulation. We should use...

Sanghyun Park

Kakao Pay IPO - Valuation and Likely Impact of Latest Announcement

Kakao Pay, one of South Korea’s largest payment and financial services apps, aims to raise up to US$1.3bn in its South Korean IPO. Kakao held a 55%...

Sumeet Singh

Kakao Pay IPO - Peer Comparison - Local and International

Kakao Pay, one of South Korea’s largest payment apps, aims to raise up to US$1.3bn in its South Korean IPO. Kakao held a 55% stake prior to...

Sumeet Singh

End of Lock Up Period + Start of Amazon Global Store Korea = Lower Share Price Likely for Coupang

The combination of the end of the lock-up period for Coupang on September 7th and the start of the Amazon Global Store Korea are likely to put...

Douglas Kim