Qutoutiao (QTT) reported earnings on Tue 3 Dec 19 (b/o)

** charts after earnings **

 

Qutoutiao misses by RMB 1.03, reports revs in-line; guides Q4 revs below two analyst estimate

Reports Q3 (Sep) loss of RMB 3.32 per share, excluding non-recurring items, RMB 1.03 worse than the S&P Capital IQ Consensus of (RMB 2.29); revenues rose 44.0% year/year to RMB 1.41 bln vs the RMB 1.4 bln two analyst estimate.

Combined average MAUs reached 133.9 million, representing an increase of 105.3% from 65.2 million in the third quarter of 2018, compared to 119.3 million in the previous quarter.

Co issues downside guidance for Q4, sees Q4 revs of RMB 1.6-1.62 bln vs. $1.85 bln two analyst estimate.

IPOs this week : March 11 - 15, 2019

IPO activity: The six-month lockup on shares of Nio (NYSE:NIO) expires on March 11 in what should be a good test of investor sentiment. Nio soared following a positive 60 Minutes piece about two weeks ago before going into post-earnings skid. Interestingly, Goldman Sachs came in with a reinstated Buy call on Nio ahead of the lockup expiration as it pointed to the Chinese automaker's "successful branding" in the premium segment.

Other lockup expirations this week include;

• 111 (NASDAQ:YI) on March 11, 
• FVC Bancorp (NASDAQ:FVCB) on March 12 and 
• both Principia Biopharma (NASDAQ:PRNB) and Qutoutiao (NASDAQ:QTT) on March 13. 

Analysts can start covering TCR2 Therapeutics (NASDAQ:TCRR), Avedro (NASDAQ:AVDR), Achiano Therapeutics (NASDAQ:ANCN) and Imac (NASDAQ:IMAC) on March 11 and Stealth BioTherapeutics (NASDAQ:MITO) on March 12.

Qutoutiao (QTT) reported earnings on Tue 5 March 19 (a/h)

** charts before earnings **

 

** charts after earnings **

Qutoutiao Inc. (QTT) shares plunged 10% in late trading Tuesday after the Chinese news-aggregation app reported earnings that showed huge growth in revenue and users, but also larger losses. Qutoutiao reported fourth-quarter losses of 398 million renminbi, or $57.9 million, on revenue of 1.33 billion renminbi, or about $193 million, up more than 400% from the year before. After adjusting for stock-based compensation and other effects, the company claimed net losses of $53.3 million, or 22 cents a share. Analysts on average expected adjusted losses of 19 cents a share on revenue of $192.3 million, according to FactSet. The company predicted 2019 revenue of 7.5 billion to 8.5 billion renminbi, after reporting 2018 sales of slightly more than 3 billion renminbi. At current exchange rates, that would be about $1.13 billion to $1.28 billion, while analysts on average were predicting $1.26 billion in 2019 revenue for the company, according to FactSet. Qutoutiao said that daily and monthly users grew more than 200% apiece from the same quarter a year ago, though it paid $108.6 million to acquire users, up nearly 700% from the year before. Qutoutiao shares closed with a 14.2% gain at $15.65 Tuesday, then dropped to about $14 in immediate after-hours action following release of the report. The company went public last year at $7 per ADR.

QTT : 1-week performance

Qutoutiao (QTT) began trading on the Nasdaq on 14 September 2018

• Chinese content aggregator Qutoutiao Inc, backed by the country’s technology giant Tencent Holdings Ltd.
• HQ: Shanghai, China
• http://www.qutoutiao.net

Priced downsized 12 mln ADS IPO (from 16 mln ADS) at $7.00, the low-end of the expected $7.00-9.00 range

The content aggregator start-up Qutoutiao, which means "fun headlines" in Chinese, collects articles and short videos from professional media and freelancers, and then presents customized feeds to users on its namesake mobile application. These feeds are optimized in real time based on each user’s profile, behavior and social relationships through the application’s AI-powered content recommendation engine.

The company ranks second among all the news apps in Apple’s Chinese App Store as of the writing, only after its biggest rival Toutiao, a Beijing-based news and information content platform.

Qutoutiao monetizes its platform mainly through advertising. Overall revenue grew to $101.2 million in the first six months of the year, up from just $16.1 million in the first half of 2017. Losses swelled as well, reaching $78 million in the first half of 2018, up from $4.3 million a year earlier. It had 17.1 million daily active users, as of July, who spent an average of 55.6 minutes on the platform each day.

Qutoutiao has close ties to Tencent, which was a lead investor in its series A financing round in January 2017 and series B financing round in March 2018.

Citigroup Global Markets, Deutsche Bank Securities, China Merchants Securities (HK) Co Ltd and UBS Securities and KeyBanc Capital Markets are the underwriters for the company’s American IPO.