How Long Will It Take To Repurchase Shares And Protect Investors' Interests?

The Limited by Share Ltd, the Pathfinder holding group (Limited by Share Ltd), which has been seeking transformation since 2013, calls for outdoor sports, tourism and sports three sectors to realize outdoor sports comprehensive service providers, but it seems that it has been in a roundabout way and its performance has been in Waterloo for many years.

But this can not hinder the determination of the Pathfinder to rise. When performance has just begun to pick up a little, the Pathfinder is offering repurchase shares to enhance investor confidence.

A few days ago, the Pathfinder issued a notice on the implementation of share repurchase and the announcement of stock changes, disclosing the share buyback plan.

In the report, the Pathfinder plans to repurchase the shares of the company by means of self raised funds within 12 months from the date of the shareholders' meeting to consider the adoption of the share repurchase scheme. The total amount of the repurchase shall not exceed RMB 50 million yuan (including 50 million yuan) and not less than 30 million yuan (including 30 million yuan), and the price of the repurchase share shall not exceed RMB 6 yuan / share. The shares will be used as a follow-up employee stock ownership plan or equity incentive plan.

Pathfinder said that the smooth implementation of the repo shares would help protect the interests of investors and maintain the image of the company's capital market, and the amount of repurchase would not have a significant impact on the company's operation, finance and future development.

Earlier, some investors questioned the news that Wang Jing, who was the leader of the interactive platform and President of Mount Everest, succeeded in reaching the top of the Mount Everest. In fact, to the Pathfinder in recent years, investors' worry is not an accident.

When is the loss of performance again?

The performance in 2018 was still disappointing after the loss of performance in 2017.

According to the 2018 annual earnings report released by Pathfinder, the operating income reached 1 billion 992 million yuan, up 34.34% from the previous period, and net profit loss attributable to shareholders of listed companies was 182 million yuan, up 114.40% from the previous period. The net loss attributable to shareholders of listed companies after deducting non recurrent losses was 213 million yuan, down 14.85% from the previous period.

In view of the decline in performance, Pathfinder said that due to the loss of other businesses in the non outdoor main business, the accumulated value of goodwill, investment and asset impairment in 2018 was more than 200 million yuan.

This is the loss of the pathfinder for second consecutive years, and net profit has been declining for 14 consecutive months. Since 2017, the Pathfinder has been losing the first time since its listing. Earnings data show that business revenue in 2017 reached 3 billion 33 million yuan, an increase of 5.41% over the same period last year. Net profit attributable to shareholders of listed companies was 84 million 500 thousand yuan, with a net loss of 185 million yuan after deducting non net profit.

In fact, the performance of Pathfinder began to decline in 2015. In 2015 -2017, the performance decreased by 10.5%, 37.13% and 151.24% respectively.

Whether the growth of the domestic outdoor sports market is slowing down, or whether the international sports brands have been distributing the Chinese market to seize the market share or the twists and turns of the Pathfinder themselves, the factors that have led to a decline in the performance of the explorer have been formed.

According to the analysis of the insiders, the Pathfinder decided that the transformation began to make other capital layout, extended to the outdoor business, gradually blurred the brand positioning and product development, and gave the domestic brand and foreign high-end brands the opportunity to seize the market, eventually losing the market share.

Diversification to return to main business

In fact, after reading the reports on the decline of the Pathfinder, there is no doubt that the diversified layout of the Pathfinder has led to the current predicament.

From A share outdoor products to the outdoor sports comprehensive service providers, Pathfinder began the transformation strategy in 2015, one after another investment and acquisition in tourism and sports field, around the development strategy of the three major business segments of outdoor, travel and sports, and constantly layout ice snow sports, sports operations, sports media, sports training and other fields.

Pathfinder has invested in Singapore online travel platform Asiatravel, China's veteran outdoor activities website green field, polar travel agency "extremely beautiful", map Road, easy to travel the world, knowledge and exploration and other companies, bringing together outdoor, travel, sports three big plates. In 2015, the Pathfinder invested 230 million yuan in holding the easy to travel world. It was the largest foreign investment project since listing, but it has not yet made profits in 2108.

Spending a lot of money to invest in many projects does not bring profits to the Pathfinder, but makes it deeper and deeper in the mire of difficulties. According to the data, in 2016, the net profit loss of the travel service sector was 34 million 100 thousand yuan, and the net profit of the sports sector was 9 million 900 thousand yuan. In 2017, the net loss of the travel service sector was 27 million 580 thousand yuan.

This is one of the factors that increase the performance loss of Pathfinder.

In such an environment, Pathfinder has to readjust its development strategy. In 2017, when Wei Wei became president of the Pathfinder, he proposed that he would return to the essence of the whole industry and make outdoor products the core business. After many years of twists and turns, he finally led the Pathfinder to start again with the core of returning to the main business.

This concept has also been recognized by the founder and current chairman and President Wang Jing. She has also established a strategic policy of "focusing on outdoor industries and integrating and distributing resources around the main industry". In 2018, Pathfinder adjusted the three aspects of marketing, channel and supply chain to further strengthen the development and application of product development technology, and improve product competitiveness from the aspects of technology protection, professional quality, comfort experience and fashion trend.

Therefore, in response to the news that the former investors questioned Wang Jing's success in reaching the Mount Everest, Wang Jing responded: "this action is to implement the relevant content of strategic cooperation signed by the Pathfinder and the Chinese mountaineering team (Tibet) in January this year, and it also bears the task of testing the latest generation of Gao Hai's ultimate HIMEX products for the Pathfinder."

This shows that Pathfinder has more actions and confidence in returning to the main business.

Although the Pathfinder still suffered losses in 2018, data showed a rebound in the first quarter of 2019. Data showed that the net profit attributable to shareholders of listed companies reached 40 million 480 thousand yuan in the first quarter, an increase of 82.45% over the same period last year, and the income of main industries of outdoor products increased by 16.05% over the same period last year. A good start for 2019's performance.

Wang Jing said in an interview with the media that outdoor sports in China is still a very young industry. There is still a certain gap between domestic outdoor brands and international brands. There are still many ways for the Pathfinder to learn from international brands in terms of brand building, product research and development, and outdoor culture promotion.