Yunji - Q2 2024

Transcript

Operator (participant)

Good morning and good evening, ladies and gentlemen. Thank you for standing by, and welcome to Yunji's Second Quarter 2024 Earnings Conference Call. With us today are Mr. Shanglue Xiao, Chairman and Chief Executive Officer, Mr. Wei Cui, Senior Financial Director, and Miss Kaye Liu, Investor Relations Director of the company. As a reminder, this conference call is being recorded. Now, I would like to turn the conference over to our first speaker, Miss Kaye Liu, IRD of Yunji. Please go ahead, ma'am.

Kaye Liu (Head of Investor Relations)

Hello, everyone. Welcome to our Second Quarter 2024 Earnings Call. Before we start, please note that is our content. Forward-looking statement within the meaning of the Private Securities Litigation Reform Act of 1995 that are based on our current expectations and current market operating conditions and relate to events that involve known or unknown risks, uncertainties and other factors affecting in this industry. These forward-looking statements can be identified by terminology such as will, expect, anticipate, continue, or other similar expressions. For a detailed discussion of these risks and uncertainties, please refer to our related documents filed with U.S. SEC. Any forward-looking statement that we make on this call are based on assumptions as of today, and are expressly qualified in their entirety by cautionary statement, risk factors, and details of the company's filing with SEC.

Yunji do not undertake any obligation to update this statement, except as required under applicable law. With that, I will now turn over to Shanglue Xiao, Chairman and CEO of Yunji.

Hello, everyone. Welcome to Yunji Second Quarter 2024 Earnings Call.

Yunji has been operating for nine years. During this time, we have seen our users grow from new parents to those welcoming a second child or entering new life stages. Our goal is to be long-term partners for our users, supporting the health of their families. In light of China's aging population and the silver economy, we are looking to expand our user base further.

Now let's discuss some of our ongoing initiatives. As part of our initiative to provide our users with a holistic health solution, we plan to expand our presence into offline communities and establish wellness spaces, bringing our healthcare products directly to consumers. In July, we opened our first offline store focusing on traditional Chinese medicine and wellness. This marks a new chapter for us in the health sector. The offline store will strengthen the connection between our online and offline services, and lay the groundwork for expanding our customer base. We aim to create a word-of-mouth network based on local communities, offering richer services, and expand our target customers groups to those aged 41 to 55. These demographic values, personal connections, and can help us attract quality customers through referrals. In addition to our offline expansion, we plan to include more organic, green, and health products.

We remain committed to our product selection criteria. We do not offer a mediocre product or attempt to be all-encompassing platform. Instead, we carefully choose quality products, set reasonable prices, and ensure value for our users. This approach allows our service managers to earn a fair profit margin.

Shanglue Xiao (Chairman and CEO)

Yunji 从创立以来，一直守护匠心品质，遵循“宽、少、精”的选品策略。我们应用数字化指标，根据使用情况评估，调整上线周期，并大力地做产品的溯源。除了自有品牌以外，一些我们主推的重点合作品牌，尤其是美食和健康品类的合作品牌，我们也会亲临原产地和工厂。我们鼓励公司各业务线管理层亲自带队去溯源，深入了解优秀单品的生产过程。比如我本人最近以每月多次的频率，前往全国各地的原产地进行溯源，分享亲身体验，让用户放心用，服务商放心推广。

...Since our founding, we have focused on quality and follow an extensive but curated product selection strategy. We use data-driven metrics to evaluate and adjust our product launch cycles based on our user feedback. Additionally, we emphasize product traceability. Beyond our private label brands, we review the origins and factories of the key partner brands, especially in food and health. We encourage our managers to lead teams in these traceability efforts to understand the production processes of quality products. Personally, I visit various origins across the country multiple times each month to share my experience and build trust with our users and service providers. Moving on to another important area, our beauty business. In the beauty sector, our private label brand, Suyue, recently celebrated its fourteenth anniversary. Over the years, Yunji has grown alongside our loyal users.

Our product development continues to focus on anti-aging solutions, where we strive to create exceptional products. Anti-aging is a high-end sector that has our technology and raw materials. We have developed a comprehensive product line, including UV-resistant sunscreens, collagen supplements, and eye care products. We are forming a complete anti-aging matrix to meet users' diverse needs. Another key number of the focus for us is marketing innovation. We are also innovating in our marketing efforts. We are combining our technology and AI development with short video content creation. Generic content no longer works in the short video era. We believe that creating unique content is key to driving traffic. We are seizing this opportunity to explore new avenues in our short video projects. Our goal is to nurture talent by teaching users how to create original content.

We provide AI support and share marketing skills to help them become distinctive content creators. At the same time, we are enhancing our service capabilities to offer content creators more resources and useful tools. While the challenges remain, we are committed to our long-term strategic goals. We are focused on improving our operations and adapting to the evolving market landscape. With that, I will turn the call over to Mr. Cui, our Senior Financial Director, to go through the financial results.

Yeqing Cui (Senior Financial Director)

Okay, thank you, Shanglue. Hello, everyone. Before I go through our financial results, please note that all numbers stated in the following remarks are in RMB terms, and all comparisons and percentage changes are year-over-year basis, unless otherwise noted. During the second quarter of twenty twenty-four, we encountered some market dynamics that influenced our operations. However, our current financial positions allow us to support our strategic initiatives as we regularly assess the profitability of both new and existing business lines, making thoughtful adjustment in response to market changes. This approach help us maintain a stable financial position in a shifting business landscape. While we continue to refine our inventory management protocols, which contribute to a growth margin of 46.6%, we are also focused on optimization our product range and supplier network to better align with customer preferences.

As we move forward, we will continue to pursuing growth opportunities prudently while ensuring our financial stability. Now, let's take a close look at our financials. Total revenues were CNY 106 million, compared to CNY 167.1 million a year ago. Revenues from sales of merchandise were CNY 83 million, and the revenues from our marketplace business were CNY 21.1 million. The changes were primarily driven by softer consumer confidence and ongoing adjustment to our product range across all categories. Additionally, the optimization of our supplier and merchant network contribute to a short-term impact on sales. Despite these changes, our gross margin remained relatively strong at 46.6%. This strength is attributed to continued customer loyalty towards our private labels and our effective product creation strategy. Now let's take a look at our operating expense.

Fulfillment expense were CNY 20.7 million, compared to CNY 29.9 million a year ago. This was mainly due to low warehousing and logistics costs, resulting from decreased merchandise sales, as well as reduced personal costs from staffing optimizations. Sales and marketing expense decreased to CNY 21.7 million from CNY 33.4 million a year ago. This was primarily a result of a decline in member management fee. Technology and content expense were CNY 12.2 million, compared to CNY 14.3 million a year ago. This was largely due to lower personal costs from staffing optimizations and a reduction in survey-server service costs. General and administrative expense were CNY 18.7 million, compared to CNY 33.2 million a year ago. This was mainly due to a reduced allowance for credit loss and a lower personal cost from staffing adjustments.

Total operation expense in the second quarter decreased to CNY 73.3 million from CNY 110.8 million in the same period of 2023. Loss from operations were CNY 23.1 million, compared to CNY 11.8 million a year ago. Net loss were CNY 11.9 million, compared to CNY 41.5 million a year ago, while adjusted net loss were CNY 9.7 million, compared with CNY 39.8 million a year ago. Basic and diluted net loss per share attributed to ordinary shareholders were both $0.01, compared to $0.02 in the same period of 2023. Turning to liquidity.

As of June 30th, 2024, we had a total of CNY 324.5 million in cash and cash equivalents, restricted cash and short-term investments on our balance sheet, compared to CNY 551.9 million as of December 31st, 2023. Our liquid assets were sufficient to cover our payable obligations, and we do not hold any long-term bank loans or debts on our balance sheet. In addition, we are dedicated to making the most of our working capital and smartly managing our assets to better support our operations. Looking ahead, we remain committed to enhancing our operational efficiencies and adapting our strategy to navigate the evolving market landscape. We believe that our ongoing improvements in inventory management and cost optimization will position us favorably for future growth.

As we continue to innovate and refine our product offerings, we are confident in our ability to regain momentum and driving long-term value for our shareholders. This concludes our prepared remarks for today's operation. We are now ready to take questions.

Operator (participant)

We will now begin the Q&A session. When asking a question, please state your name in Chinese first, then repeat your question in English for the convenience of everyone on the call. To take a question, you may press star, then one on your touch-tone phone. If you're using a speakerphone, please pick up your handset before pressing the keys. If at any time your question has been addressed and you would like to withdraw your question, please press star and then two. Our first question comes from Ethan Yu with First Trust China. Please go ahead.

Ethan Yu (Analyst)

Hi. Hi, good evening. Thanks for taking my question. I have a question about our business operation. Mr. Xiao just mentioned that you have participated in numerous product traceability efforts. Could you share more color from this experience? And, how will these insights be applied to our product selection and operation at Yunji?

Yeqing Cui (Senior Financial Director)

Thank you for your question.

... I've been traveling across the country almost every week for product traceability. In fact, there are many good merchants and supply chains in China, especially for high demand and a high repurchase rate products like meat, eggs, and dairy. However, we cannot simply rely on inspection reports, historical sales data, and various promotional materials to confidently introduce those merchants to our platform. Only more authentic, cost-effective, and healthy products, which are better suited to the physique of the Chinese people, can bring real value to our users. These require our team to explore and experience personally. These general experience sharing material from Yunji's traceability activities can gain more consumer trust. Additionally, along with offline traceability, we can host more offline salons and tasting events, leveraging the advantages of a face-to-face communication to acquire loyal customers.

With such offline salon and offline traceability activities, we are going to create the products that are going to go to the deep heart of the consumers, and those products and the related materials are going to encourage the consumers to buy on our platform. Thank you for your question.

Ethan Yu (Analyst)

Great, thanks. I have no more questions. Thanks.

Operator (participant)

As there are no further questions at this time, I'd like to hand the call back over to management for any closing remarks.

Kaye Liu (Head of Investor Relations)

Thank you for joining us today. Please do not hesitate to contact us if you have any further questions, and we look forward to talking with you next quarter. Bye.

Operator (participant)

The conference is now concluded. Thank you for attending. You may now disconnect.