Consumer

• Lawson Inc (2651 JP) acquired the upmarket supermarket operator, Seijo Ishii, in 2014 for ¥55 billion.
• It is now considering plans for an IPO for Seijo next year following a boom in the company’s fortunes during the pandemic.
• Net profit rose 13% last year and the potential for growth remains strong given the expansion of the wealth market in Japan. 

• Uniti Group Ltd (UWL AU) has now entered into a Scheme Implementation Deed (SID) with the Morrison/Brookfield Consortium.
• The Offer price remains at A$5.00/share, in line with the revised proposal on the 29 March. 
• Uniti’s Board of Directors unanimously recommends that Uniti shareholders vote in favour of the Scheme in the absence of a Superior Proposal. 

• Uniti Group Ltd (UWL AU) has entered a SID with the Morrison/Brookfield consortium at A$5.00 cash per share less dividends declared or paid after today. 
• The key scheme conditions are shareholder approval, FIRB approval and Court approval. The scheme meeting will be held in July.
• We think that the offer is attractive. At the last close price of A$4.96, the gross and annualised spread to a July-end effective date is 0.8% and 2.8%, respectively.

• Mitra Adiperkasa’s results this week confirm a strong recovery is in place, with improving margins and growth across all verticals and a return to profitability for FY2021. 
• Growth was evident in both online and offline channels as the company’s unified retail strategy continues to yield strong results plus inventory levels improved dramatically QoQ in 4Q2021.
• Mitra Adiperkasa (MAPI IJ) remains a key proxy for the retail recovery in Indonesia and has remoulded itself to changing consumer behaviour. Valuations remain attractive versus historical levels. 

• The S&P 500 Index finished the first quarter down 4.6%, snapping a run of seven straight quarters of positive returns.
• The stock market is above the 90th percentile in almost every valuation metric and could be vulnerable to a materially slower U.S. economy, which it does not seem to be discounting.
• Credit spreads widened, parts of the yield curve inverted, and the Fed began to drain liquidity via interest rate increases and stated its intent to reduce its balance sheet

• On April 14, S Foods (2292, the company) announced FY2/22 sales of 358.8bn yen (+9.6% YoY) and OP of 17.4bn yen (+38.2% YoY, OPM 4.9%)
• The company’s full-year guidance for FY2/23 is sales of 375.0bn yen (+4.5% YoY), OP of 14.8bn yen (-15.1% YoY; OPM 3.9%), and NP of 10.0bn yen (-16.3% YoY)
• The company’s strong performance in the U.S. should make it a relatively strong performer among major meatpackers.

• ClearBridge is a leading global asset manager committed to active management.
• The Strategy underperformed the benchmark as elevated levels of uncertainty and volatility during the quarter put pressure on mid cap stocks.
• We are confident in our current portfolio construction and believe our holdings will persevere through these short- term challenges.

• Indonesia’s leading UHT milk and carton tea producer Ultrajaya Milk Industry booked a strong set of FY2021 results, with a convincing recovery in 4Q2021, which should carry through into FY2022. 
• The company continues to increase raw milk sourcing locally, which will alleviate rising global prices, and it is expanding its distribution network and new products to drive demand. 
• Ultrajaya is a market leader in its main product categories, yet trades at half the valuation of recently listed Cisarua Mountain Dairy, which looks excessive with potential upside to valuation.

• Last week, MINISO Group Holdings (MNSO US) filed an application to conduct a follow-on public offering of ordinary shares on the main board of the Hong Kong Stock Exchange.
• The Hong Kong listing will be treated as a second primary listing, resulting in a substantial improvement in the stock’s liquidity.
• With the improvement in liquidity following the Hong Kong offer, there could be a significant upside to Miniso shares in the short term.

• Tesla Shanghai is still down nearly two weeks so far on stringent health orders to address surging Covid cases across China.
• This threatens Tesla’s second quarter results just after it likely missed market expectations for record first quarter results.
• And still not a peep out of Tesla CEO Elon Musk, who rarely misses a chance to complainabout government oversight—at least in the US.

• March SSS: 106.3% vs. 2021, 103.7% vs. 2019 (pre-pandemic)

• Same-store sales of other revolving sushi formats in March (compared to March 2021 and March 2019) were 93.5% and 96.8% for Sushiro (Food & Life Companies), 104.4% and 89.9% for Genki Sushi, and 89.7% and 82.2% for Kappa Sushi, respectively

• The number of stores at the end of February was 510 in Japan (+3 MoM), 37 in the U.S. (+1 MoM), and 45 in Taiwan (+1 MoM). The total number of stores was 592 (+5 MoM)

• Vltava is a global equity investment fund.
• Its objective is to achieve long-term capital growth of the assets under management while investing primarily into publicly traded companies.
• If Putin has succeeded in anything, it is to completely dismantle a functioning domestic economy virtually overnight.
• We probably never have seen anything like this before.

• As per an update released by Marico Ltd (MRCO) on 5th April2022, the FMCG sector continued to witness subdued consumption patterns, primarily on account of weak rural sentiments and persistent inflation in global commodities.
• Inflation, accompanied by price hikes implemented across FMCG categories, affected consumer wallets and eventually resulted in decline in FMCG volume.
• Despite stressed macros, MRCO’s domestic business (~75% of topline) saw low single-digit revenue growth on the back of focused execution and market share gains

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