MINISO Group Holding Limited

You can confirm your identity with us. Thank you for your cooperation. Ladies and gentlemen, thank you for standing by and welcome to Minnesota's Holding Limited Early Conference for the first quarter of fiscal year 2022, that's ending June 13, 2022. At this time, all participants are in a listen-only mode. After the management prepare remarks, we will conduct a question and answer session. Please note this event is being recorded. Now, I'd like to hand the conference over to your host speaker today, Mr. Ethan Zhang, Director of Capital Markets. Please go ahead, Ethan.

Thank you. Hello, everyone, and thank you all for joining us. We have announced our quarterly financial results earlier today. An earnings release is now available on our investor relations website at ir.minasol.com. Joining us today are our founder and CEO, Mr. Jack Yeh, and CFO, Mr. Steven Zhang. Before continuing, I'd like to refer you to the Safe Harbor Statement in our earnings press release, which also applies to this call, as we'll be making forward-looking statements. Please also note that we'll discuss non-IFRS measures today, which we have explained and reconciled to the most comparable measures reported on the international financial reporting standards in the company's earnings press release and fundings with the US SEC and Hong Kong Stock Exchange. With that, I now turn the call over to Mr. Ye. Please go ahead.

Hello, everyone. Welcome to the Mingtao Goods 630 quarter financial reporting meeting. This quarter is the end of the fiscal year of the company in 2022. It is also our first quarter.

Thank you. Hello, Ron, and welcome to Minister Group's June 4, 2022 Earnings Conference Call. This marks the last quarter of our fiscal year, 2022, and the first time we have announced results as a new primary listed company in the U.S. and Hong Kong.

Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you.

Thanks to the efforts of our dedicated team, we completed our listing in Hong Kong on July 13th this year. Our listing in Hong Kong was an important arrangement from the perspective of protecting the interests of our existing shareholders. and proactively responding to the evolving regulatory environment. We believe it will also provide us with more broader financing channels to drive the company's future development, help us expand our shareholder base, and promote the sustainable health development of our business. On behalf of the company, I'd like to express my gratitude to each and every employee for their dedication and to our investors who have always cared for and supported Minnesotans. Going forward, we are confident that we will create long-term value for shareholders by enabling everyone to better enjoy life's little surprise.

As we have emphasized in the past several stages of the development meeting, JIAZI has the ability to participate in the economic cycle. Although the epidemic has continued for a long time, causing short-term performance pressures, but our business model is very stable. China China China China China China So, as we have repeatedly emphasized in our earnings conference calls over the past few quarters, value retailers are capable of passing through economic cycles.

Our business model has demonstrated great resilience despite the pandemic win on our new term results. During this quarter, we have been promoting our brand upgrade efforts in China and the gross margin of our domestic operations in the June quarter increased by about 3% from the same period of last year as we have launched a new portfolio of high gross margin consumption based products. During this quarter, as the domestic offline retail sector faced unprecedented challenges, we focused on driving the recovery of our overseas business, which achieved nearly 50% year-over-year growth in revenue and accounted for 34% of the company's total revenue, the highest since the outbreak of the pandemic in early 2020. Then, fitting from these two drivers, Our overall gross margin reached a record high of 33.3% in this quarter. Our recent business performance demonstrates that our globalized presence has given us much greater flexibility when facing pandemic-related uncertainty in China. As we continue to unleash the operating leverage of our directly operated overseas business, And further, our efforts to reduce costs and improve efficiency, our adjusted net profit increased by 57% year-over-year to remain be 220 million in the June quarter, which is double the figure from the prior quarter. Our adjusted net margin reached its highest level of the past 10 quarters at 9.6%. Returning to a level similar to what we have achieved before the pandemic. 下面我分业务板块为大家详细介绍本季度的业务开展情况。 Next, I'll share in detail the development of our respective business segments during the quarter. First, I'll cover our domestic operations. Revenue in this quarter was maybe 1.41 billion, of which revenue from offline business was maybe 1.28 billion, which compared to maybe 1.82 billion and maybe 1.63 billion in the same period last year, respectively. We estimate that the GMV lost due to the impact of the pandemic was about 700 million and the corresponding loss of accounting revenue was over 400 million. More specifically, our sales decreased by nearly 30% year-over-year in April and May as a result of the reduced traffic to shopping malls, many of which were unable to operate due to local government restrictions. In April, an average of 380 or 12% of Minnesota stores in China were unable to operate. The number was down by about 100 in May, but still accounted for nearly 9% of all stores. Going into June, as key cities gradually reopened, Talking more, traffic recovered rapidly and main stores resumed normal operations. Temporary store closures were further down to 60% or 2% of all stores. Our sales in June recovered to 94% of the level from the same period last year. That figure was nearly 90% in Tier 1 and Tier 2 cities, whereas in Tier 3 and below cities, we saw year-on-year growth of nearly 1%.

E-commerce revenue in quarter was maybe 130 million.

As an important compliment to our offline channels, revenue itself is not the most important KPI for e-commerce. Instead, we focus more on its profitability, which has been increasing over the past years through our reasonable control of traffic acquisition costs.

Since the outbreak of the epidemic in the past two years, the public-private partnership model has shown tremendous resilience. Due to the fact that business owners do not have to bear the risk of loss, It is possible to receive government-funded services at the same time. The pressure of supply and demand is less than that of other retail business models. This quarter, under the huge impact of the epidemic, our business expansion team has still completed 29 domestic private stores in China. It is about 1.1% less than the previous quarter. From the point of view of 2022, domestic B2B materials have decreased by nearly 40%.

The Minnesota Retail Partner Model has demonstrated its great resilience during the pandemic outbreak. As Minnesota Retail Partners face minimal inventory risk and always receive their revenue share on time, the working capital pressure is much lower than in other franchisee models. This quarter, despite the tremendous pressure of the pandemic, our business development team still added 29 scores on a net basis. and contend the quarterly store closure ratio to about 1.1%, the lowest level of the past eight quarters. In the fiscal year 2022, the number of store closures in China decreased by 40, compared with the previous year.

Due to the COVID-19 pandemic in the first and second-tier cities, the situation is getting more and more strict. Almost all of the newly opened stores in China are located in the third-tier cities. In 2019,

As the control measures were stricter in Tier 1 and Tier 2 cities, new means of stores in China in this quarter came entirely from Tier 3 and below cities. For the remaining four months of 2022, we will dynamically adjust the store opening pace according to the pandemic developments in China. to lower operating risk of Minnesotan retail partners.

Moving on to Minnesotan overseas operations, revenue for June quarter was about $30 million.

780 million, an increase of almost 50% year-on-year. Revenue from our distributor business model increased by more than 30% year-on-year. Revenue from our directly operated business model increased by about 70% year-on-year.

During the June quarter, the overseas market sustained good recovery momentum, and overall sales increased by 52% year-on-year and recovered to over 90% over the same period in 2019.

Sales in our distributor markets increased by 45% year-on-year and have already recovered to nearly 100% of the same period in 2019, while sales in our direct-operated markets increased by nearly 80% year-on-year and have recovered to 80% of the same period in 2019.

The market share of North America has increased by nearly 170% compared to 2019. The market share of Latin America has increased by nearly 60% compared to 2019. The market share of China has increased by nearly 30% compared to 2019. The market share of Asia has increased by nearly 60% compared to 2019. The market share of China has increased by nearly 60% compared to 2019. But regions, sales in Europe increased by nearly 40% year-on-year and more than doubled that in the same period in 2019. Sales in North America increased by nearly 170% year-on-year

up 13% from same period in 2019. Sales in Latin America increased by nearly 60% year-on-year, up more than 10% from the same period in 2019. Sales in the Middle East and North Africa increased by nearly 30% year-on-year, up 60% from the same period in 2019. And sales in Asian countries, including China, increased by over 50% year-on-year, recovering to nearly 60% of the same period in 2019. Asian countries, excluding China, is so far the only market that has not fully recovered to pre-COVID levels in sales. By country, sales in both the US and Canada increased by nearly 170% year-on-year. Mexico increased by over 50%, while India nearly tripled.

We have entered the top 105 markets in the world in this quarter and nearly increased to 57 overseas stores. Last year, we nearly increased to 35. Overseas markets have already entered a post-pandemic era. With the growing demand of agents, we have accelerated the opening up of overseas markets this year. Although some overseas markets have caused some delays in the opening up of agents for reasons such as lack of access and geopolitical tension, But we still have confidence that the 2022 opening of overseas stores will exceed 2021.

Minnesota entered its 105th market in June quarter and added 57 overseas stores on net basis, compared to 35 stores in the same period last year. The overseas market has entered the post-pandemic era, and with the strong demand growth from distributors, we have speeded up this the pace of opening overseas stores this year. Although due to the Russia-Ukraine conflict and the geopolitical tension, which has delayed some of our distributors' store opening plans, we are still confident that the number of new overseas stores opened in the calendar year of 2022 on that basis will be significantly higher than in 2021.

The consumers will pay more attention to the cost-effectiveness. This is a good market opportunity for us. We insist on product glory. We will continue to enhance the design power of overseas. Currently, we are continuously sending domestic product teams overseas to further enrich our ability in product design and research and development. Currently, the major overseas markets have gradually acquired the product innovation ability of Q11. Next, we will focus on building overseas market goods in Latin America, North America, Southeast Asia, and Europe.

Under the current high inflation environment in overseas markets, consumers tend to look for more value, which creates great market opportunities for us. We adhere to the product is king philosophy and will continue to enhance our overseas design capacities. by sending our domestic product teams overseas to further strengthen our product design capabilities and develop localized products. At present, we have built preliminary capabilities to launch products in a 7-1-1 manner in major overseas markets. Our next focus is on Latin America, North America, Southeast Asia, and Europe. where our goal is to provide more and more localized products to consumers there. We continue to leverage China's strong supply chain capabilities and benefit from exporting the Chinese supply chain overseas.

We have been monitoring the development and implementation of the 3.0 digital door-to-door digital door-to-door digital door-to-door digital door-to-door digital door-to-door digital door-to-door digital door-to-door As we continue to cultivate in overseas markets, we have launched the Minnesota Store Image 3.1 project to improve the visual compassiveness of our stores in some of these markets.

We also proactively assist overseas distributors in refining their operating strategies. Taking our distributor in Spain as an example, it has achieved improved performance by shifting its focus from tourist areas to local communities to reduce its reliance on tourists.

Next, let's talk about TopToy.

We continue to execute our established strategy in quarter and made steady progress. While revenue of TopToy increased by 43% year-on-year, while its online business contributed 15% of revenue in this quarter.

The price of this product is close to 42%. Although the price has dropped in the previous quarter, it is still at a very healthy level. More importantly, it is consistent with our old strategy. The price of this product is close to 42%. The price of this product is close to 42%. The price of this product is close to 42%.

In response to the pandemic in China, TopToy stepped up some promotional campaigns. As a result, its merchandise gross margin was about 42% in June quarter, which, although lower than the previous quarters, is still a healthy level. More importantly, the sales mix between TopToy's proprietary products and third-party products has been moving towards a more reasonable level, matching our consistent product strategies. Proprietary products accounted for nearly 20% of top toy sales and the gross margin of proprietary products remained over 60%.

Looking back over the 2022 fiscal year, our key operating metrics have demonstrated that we are in a healthy growth space.

We added 514 scores on net basis, representing 11% year-on-year growth. Revenue exceeded Renminbi 10 billion, up 11% year-on-year. Worth profit exceeded Renminbi 3 billion, up 26% year-on-year. Worth margin reached 30.4%, up 3.6% point year-on-year. Adjusting net profit, Renminbi 720 million, up 51% year-on-year. The net margin was 7.2%, up nearly 2 percentage points year-on-year.

This is a constant trend. As you may have noticed, we issued a statement last week. It is a sincere and positive attitude towards the company's unruly marketing strategy before it was listed in the early days. It has made a profound reflection and made a change. After the company was listed in Hong Kong, it needs to strictly abide by the rules of the two exchanges. It has a higher requirement for us to comply with the rules. Looking forward to 2023 fiscal year. We are still optimistic about future revenue and profit growth despite continued uncertainty from the pandemic.

This positive outlook comes from our long-term confidence in China's economic development, our unchanged ambition for offline retail business, and our consistent determination to achieve globalized development. Lastly, as you may have noticed, we issued a heartfelt letter of apology last week in which we moved over the inappropriate marketing tactic in our early days before becoming a listed company and announced a correction plan. In the future, as a dual primary listed company, we will strictly comply with the regulations of both exchanges, which creates a greater level of compliance requirements for the company. Going forward, we'll continue to raise our compliance standards to govern our operations to guarantee the sustainable success of our core business. That concludes my prepared remarks. I will now turn it over to Sefo for financial review. Please.

Hello, everyone. Thank you for joining us today. I will walk you through the financial results of June quarter as well as the full fiscal year 2022. Please be noted that all the numbers are in RMB unless otherwise stated. And I will also refer to some non-IFRS measures, which have excluded share-based compensation expenses. Revenue in June quarter reached 2.3 billion, above the midpoint of our guidance range, which was 2.1 billion to 2.4 billion, which implies a better than expected performance in our domestic operation in June. Revenue from China was $1.5 billion, including $1.4 billion from Minnesota Grand, and $95 million from Toltoi Grand, and $28 million from others. Of these, revenue from Minnesota Grand experienced a year-over-year decline of 23%, consistent with the decline trend of GMV and offline traffic, to shopping mall. Revenue from pop toys increased by 33% year over year. During this quarter, pop toys sales was significantly impacted by the outbreak of Omicron virus due to the concentration of stores in tier one and tier two cities. As we have concluded in the previous call in May, Although the impact of pandemic on short-term performance is inevitable, we continued to follow our established strategy and made a steady performance in refined top toys business model, products, and only channel strategy. For our overseas market, its revenue increased by 49% year-over-year to $7.5 billion. 85 million. If we look at the financial year 2020, the year-over-year increase in revenue was also about 50%, which demonstrates the recovery trend of our overseas operation is very clear. For full fiscal year 2022, total revenue reached 10.1 billion. and increased over 11% from fiscal year 2021. Revenue from our domestic operation was 7.4 billion, increased by 2% from a year ago. Of these, revenue from domestic operation increased by 15% in the first half of fiscal year 2022, and decreased by 10% in the second half due to the spread of Omicron in China. Revenue generated from PopCoin was 447 million, representing an increase of 355% year-over-year. Gross profit in June quarter was 772 million, representing an increase of 21% year-over-year. Gross margin was 33.3% compared to 25.8% in the same period of 2021. There were three reasons for the year-over-year increase in growth margin. First, it was primarily due to the revenue mix change. This quarter, we have seen overseas market contribute 34% of total revenue. It's the highest level since the December quarter of 2019. Secondly, we launched a more profitable product in relating to Minnesota's strategic grant upgrade in this quarter. And the third reason is about the inventory clearance activity last year. That aimed to take over the negative impact of the pandemic in Guangdong. For full year, gross profit was 3.1 billion, up 26% year-over-year. Growth margin was 30.4%, compared to 26.8% in the fiscal year 2021. Serving and distribution expense in June quarter was 346 million, representing an increase of 31% year-over-year. The year-over-year increase was primarily attributed to, first, increased logistic expense in relating to our recovering international operations. Second, increased personnel-related expense. And third, increased license expense in relating to our newly launched IP products, partly offset by our saving in promotion and advertisement expense. due to our reduced marketing effort in China to tackle the resurgence of the COVID-19. For the full year, selling and distribution expense was approximately $1.4 billion, representing an increase of 29% year-over-year. The year-over-year increase was primarily attributed to, first, increase of personnel-related expense, second, Increased license expense in relating to our enlarging IP library and enriching offering of IP products. And the third, increased the promotion and the advertisement expense, mainly connecting to a strategic brand update of Miniso in China. P&A expense in June quarter were 180 million, representing a decrease of 5% year-over-year. The year-over-year decrease was primarily due to decrease of personnel-related expense. For full year, G and A expense were $785 million, representing an increase of 19% year-over-year. The year-over-year increase was primarily due to, first, increase the depreciation and amortization expense mainly related to the land use rights of the company in the headquarter building project. And the second, increase the personnel related expense, which were partly offset by decrease of office operating expense as a result of expense control measures taken by the company to tackle the resurgence of the COVID-19 in China. Turning to profitability. Operating profit in June quarter was 272 million, representing an increase of 45% year-over-year. Operating margin was 11.7%, compared to 7.6% a year ago. For full fiscal year 2022, operating profit was 882 million. representing an increase of 120% year-over-year. Operating margin was 8.7% compared to 4.4% in the fiscal year 2021. Adjusted net profit in June quarter was 223 million, representing an increase of 57% year-over-year. Adjusted net margin was 9.6% compared to 5.7% in the same period of 2021. For full year, adjusted net profit was $723 million, representing an increase of 51% year-over-year. Adjusted net margin was 7.2%. compared to 5.3% in fiscal year 2021. Adjusted basic and diluted earnings per ADS in June quarter were $0.72, up 50% year over year. For full year, adjusted basic and diluted earnings per ADS were $2.40 and $2.36, respectively. representing an increase of 43% and 40% year-over-year respectively. Turning to cash position, as of end of June, we had a cash position of $5.8 billion. On August 17, 2022, our board of directors approved a special cash dividend in the amount of approximately $53.5 million, or 360 million RMB, up 20% year-over-year. Our capital allocation strategy in the future will balance new growth opportunity and our commitment to bring stable return to shareholders. Turning to working capital. Turnovers of inventory and the trade receivable remain stabilized. As a newly listed company on Hong Kong Stock Exchange, we follow the common practice adopted by the public company in the Hong Kong market, and we will no longer provide the guidance on revenue growth going forward. That being said, as we approach the last month of September quarter, we have observed encouraging sales recovery in China, which has stabilized at a healthy level during the past several weeks. Looking forward into the coming quarter, we expect our bottom line performance will further normalize because of our discipline's execution of brand upgrades and the steady recovery of overseas operations. Thank you. And this concludes our prepared remarks. Operator, we are now ready to take questions.

Thank you. We are now beginning the question and answer session. Your first question today comes from the line of Mr. Chen from Goldman Sachs. Please go ahead.

Thank you, Mr. Yeh, Steven, Ethan. Sorry. So my question is about the brand upgrade. So a brand upgrade actually drives the growth margin quite significantly in the past quarters. So can management comment our strategies into second half? And what's the growth margin upside and whether there's any related operating expenses for the brand upgrade? Thank you.

Thank you. The upgrade of the brand will be based on three aspects of product channels and transmission systems. The second is that we will continue to improve new products according to the plan, especially the price of products for consumer consumption. We have just mentioned that the price of our domestic products has increased by about 3% in this quarter. This quarter is about 54%, which is close to 51% last year. According to the current plan, we plan to finish by the end of 2023, that is, by this time next year, the retail price will increase by about 5 points to nearly 60%. The third aspect is that in terms of the channel, we plan to systematically optimize the business and profit capacity of the second-tier market to help the domestic market to increase the risk-resistant capacity. In terms of the fourth group wave, we originally planned to promote a brand upgrade in the 930 system, Thank you, Michelle, for the question. This is Jack.

For questions, as we have communicated in our last call back in March, our Minisource brand strategic upgrade will come from three ways, in product, in channel, and in marketing. In terms of products, we will continue to improve the growth margin of newly launched products, especially those consumer products. interest-based consumption products on a regular basis as planned. As mentioned just now, our domestic growth profit margin increased by about 3% year-on-year this quarter to about 54% from nearly 51% last year. So our current plan is that by the end of fiscal year 2023, which is this time next year, we plan to have improved our gross merchandise margin by another five percentage points to close to 60%. In terms of channels, we plan to systematically optimize offline business and profitability in the tier one to two cities and to help our retail partners to reduce operational risk. And in terms of marketing, we originally had a marketing plan in the September quarter as we communicated. And the budget was around RMB 50 million or so. But however, considering the current domestic situation of the pandemic and its possible outbreak, restrict control measures will continue for some time. So we have decided to delay or postpone these market contents and to save a part of the cost. And this will have positive impact on profit in September quarter. So I hope this helps answer your question. Thank you.

Thank you.

The next question is from the line of . Jeffrey, please open the microphone. Thank you, Manager Chen. Thank you, President Ye. I would like to ask about the announcement on Weibo. We hope to go to Japan by March next year. I would like to ask what we need to do. Now, let me translate in English, you know, just regarding your letter, you know, to the public, you know, regarding, like, you know, minimize some of these, like, you know, sort of, quote, unquote, like, you know, the Japanese influence. um so um what exactly you know as a strategy you know regarding like you know um how how how do you change in terms of the operation uh our um our concern is that you know whether um all these changes will impact you know your image or your uh your your performance uh or your like you know your brand equity you know, from the consumer's angle, both for overseas as well as the domestic client. So I would like to get more information about what is your plan. Thank you.

Okay, thank you. There are three points in the reform policy. First, to enhance the speed of Jiameng, especially to promote topics related to politics, to establish a global brand structure, and to report to the headquarters. The headquarters conducts critical awareness training to all employees. I mean, I mean, I mean, I mean. is 95% of what it was last year. In August, GMV and last year's video in the first three weeks, some of the reasons are that there was an epidemic in Nanjing last year. As with the previous situation, we saw that the sales volume in July and August continued to recover, mainly due to the recovery of customer traffic. Customer price has shown a growth of a low number. In addition, in July and August, the overall GMV in the first three weeks of overseas delivery increased by about 30% to 40%. OK.

Thank you, Anne, for the question. This is Jack. So in terms of your question about the correction plan of this event, so we have three specific measures. The first is strengthening the internal control environment of our distributors in overseas markets, and especially, you know, in relation to the political sensitive issues. And we will establish, you know, in our headquarters, a globalized, you know, our globalized headquarters of branding center. And we have all these marketing person in overseas market report to headquarters. And these headquarters, they will regularly organize related trainings for the frontline personnel. And the second is on the operational side. And we have given a timeline in the correction plan that the rectification shall be completed before the end of March next year. And the third is from product level. So we will export more Chinese cultural or Chinese traditional elements embedded products and plan to launch a series of Chinese IP products to overseas markets. For your second question about the impact on our sales in Chinese market, in domestic market, we have not observed an impact from both China and overseas markets. So in China, in July, the total GMV was about 95% of last year. And if you look at the first three quarters of August, it was flat year over year. And as we mentioned earlier, in the last several quarters, This recovery from sales in China, many come from the recovery from the food traffic to shopping malls, while our ASP remain a gross or low single digit. And in terms of overseas market, if you look at the July and the first three weeks of August, the total GMB in our overseas distributors it increased by about 30% to 40% on year-to-year basis. And if you look at our directly operated business, the year-to-year growth was even higher, about 50%. Thank you for the question. 了解,那我们第一个就是说我们有一个增加我们的一个

Is there any additional cost involved in this exercise? Thank you.

Thank you. And this is Steven. Let me quickly translate for Steven. So for the internal control measures, there will be some, but we do not think that it will increase our related expense significantly and will not impact our earnings. Thank you.

Thank you.

Thank you. The next question is from the line of Lucy Yu from Bank of America Merrill Lynch. Line is open. Please go ahead. Thank you, Mr. Ye. Thank you, Mr. Zhang. Thank you, Mr. Ye. My question is about our development overseas. We are now facing a potential economic downturn in Europe and the United States. Do we need to worry about this downturn having a potential impact on us and our judgment on our future overseas opening projects? Will it have a certain impact? So we are facing potential recession in U.S. and Europe. Should we worry about impact of recession on our business and whether that will impact our overseas expansion plan? Thank you.

Taiwan Taiwan Taiwan Taiwan Taiwan Taiwan

Thank you, Lucy. This is Jack. I will cover this question. So in terms of question on the store expansion in overseas market, we have to say that currently we see a strong demand from our overseas distributors and the pipeline is also strong. But we also have to be frankly speaking that the Russia-Ukraine conflict and the evolving geopolitical risks in some of overseas markets are now impacting in different ways and aspects to our overseas distributors' store opening plan. And some of them have delayed the store expansion plan in this quarter. But if you look at the past several years, from fiscal year 2022 to fiscal year 2021, 2020 to fiscal year 2022, our overseas markets net added 275, 121, and 163 stores. So we are now quite confident that in fiscal year 2023, the net addition of our stores in overseas market as a whole will be significantly higher than that in 2022. Thank you.

Thank you once again for joining us today. If you have any further questions, please contact me so you have the relations team. Our contact information can be found on today's press release. We will see you next