Text/Photo by Yangcheng Evening News reporter Hu Yanlin Xi
"Blind box first share" Bubble Mart International Group Co., Ltd. (hereinafter referred to as Bubble Mart, 9992.HK) "debut is the peak".
Flush data shows that after reaching a historical high of about HK$150 billion in market value and about HK$107.6 per share in early 2021, Bubble Mart went downhill.
In July this year, the market value once fell to less than HK$30 billion, the stock price fell below HK$20 in the same month, and the cumulative decline in July exceeded 50%.
On August 12, its stock price was reported at HK$18.60, with a market value of HK$25.995 billion, a drop of more than 80% from its peak market value.
The shrinking market value and the "diving" of the stock price, accompanied by 10,000 "exit" notes and more than 8,000 consumer complaints, are behind the sudden braking of Bubble Mart's performance in the first half of the year.
Analysts believe that the blind box market tends to develop rationally. Is the trend of playing games ebbing?
Performance growth is difficult to prevent stock price fluctuations
The market value is less than 20% of the highest point
Although Bubble Mart's performance is leading the industry, it still cannot stop market fluctuations.
The 2021 financial report shows that its 2021 revenue will be 4.49 billion yuan, a year-on-year increase of 78.7%; its adjusted net profit will be 1.002 billion yuan, a year-on-year increase of 69.6%.
The cumulative number of registered members reached 19.58 million, with 12.18 million newly registered members, a record high.
In addition, 106 new stores were opened in mainland China; online channels developed rapidly, and the revenue from box extractors was RMB 898 million, a year-on-year increase of 92.6%.
On July 16, Bubble Mart opened its first store in Tokyo, Japan.
Just the day before, it issued a "Profit Warning Announcement" showing that it is expected that the revenue in the first half of this year may increase by no less than 30% compared with the same period last year, and the group's profit will decrease by no more than 35% compared with the same period last year.
Bubble Mart’s explanation for the fluctuations in performance has two main points. First, in the first half of 2022, due to the repeated domestic epidemics, the company suspended the operation of several offline stores and robot stores in some regions (mainly first- and second-tier cities). The prolonged timeliness of logistics affects online sales, as well as the weakening of passenger flow and consumer desire, resulting in a decline in performance growth.
Secondly, the company's previous business expansion has led to an increase in expenses compared with the same period last year, so profits will also decline, but after the epidemic improves, the proportion of these expenses is expected to decline in the future.
After the release of the profit warning in the first half of the year, Bubble Mart immediately started a large-scale repurchase.
From July 18 to August 11, a total of 21.397 million shares were repurchased, with a cumulative repurchase amount of approximately HK$382 million.
However, according to Baidu Stock Exchange, on August 12, the market value of Bubble Mart was 25.995 billion Hong Kong dollars, which was only 17.33% of the nearly 150 billion Hong Kong dollars at the peak of the market value, and shrunk by more than 80%.
10,000 "exit" notes are second-hand and lively
One is the market value "jumping off the cliff", and the other is the user's withdrawal.
There are more than 10,000 notes on "Bubble Mart's withdrawal from the pit" on Xiaohongshu.
Miss Li from Sichuan, who calls herself "Old Leek", told a reporter from the Yangcheng Evening News that she spent a total of 50,000 to 60,000 yuan on Bubble Mart, with a unit price ranging from tens to hundreds of yuan.
Due to too much investment, she finally decided to keep only the products she likes, and sell the rest on Xianyu. At present, there are 193 blind box products left.
Jiangsu user "Yongye Yajia" said in his notes that the blind box he bought can be displayed as a "10,000 yuan wall". At first, he liked the unknown and surprise of the blind box. Later, in the pursuit of popular models, if he did not win the draw, he would I will be lost, and the fun will change, so I "retreat half of the pit".
In addition to returning to rational consumption, the reason for "exiting the pit" also involves concerns about safety and quality issues.
Some consumers reported that the purchased Bubble Mart dolls had a pungent odor, and they suspected that the formaldehyde exceeded the standard.
There are also many posts expressing disappointment with the quality control issues.
On the black cat complaint, as of press time, there are more than 8,800 complaints related to Bubble Mart, of which more than 6,700 are "completed".
In the secondary market, doll preservation is declining.
Some analysts believe that if the premium space for second-hand platforms decreases, players will gradually “retire”.
Several Bubble Mart "ten thousand yuan households" interviewed by a reporter from the Yangcheng Evening News said that the price of some second-hand products is equivalent to a "half cut" of new products.
The SPACE MOLLY watermelon, which was once fired for 14,000 yuan, is limited to 2,500 pieces. Now you can get it at Xianyu by removing one zero. The ordinary model is even more "cabbage price" in the secondary market.
On Xiaohongshu and Xianyu, some new unopened blind boxes with original prices of 59 yuan, 69 yuan, 79 yuan, and 89 yuan are sold at a unit price of more than ten or twenty yuan, and the unit price of some dismantled models is even cheaper. to single digits.
"The original price is 138 yuan for two, and I only buy three second-hand ones for 100 yuan." Miss Li said.
Is the industry trending to standardize the blind box fever?
Behind Bubble Mart users starting to retreat, it shows that the blind box operation is entering the track limited by regulations and heading for a more rational direction.
For example, the "Shanghai Blind Box Business Activities Compliance Guidelines" and "Ganzhou Blind Box Production and Business Activities Compliance Guidelines" and other regulations, all carry out the blind box price, extraction rules, guarantee mechanism, after-sales, and minor protection mechanism. regulations.
Among them, Shanghai stipulates that the price of a single blind box is generally not more than 200 yuan.
Blind box pricing has long been criticized.
Zhang Yi, CEO and chief analyst of iiMedia Research Consulting Group, told the Yangcheng Evening News reporter that it is not recommended to assign financial attributes to commodities such as blind boxes or use their hype.
When there is a serious deviation between the value and price of a product, it will definitely lead to financial risks for consumers, which is commonly known as "cutting leeks", which is also a great harm to the brand.
Therefore, consumers need to think rationally and choose carefully, and it is not recommended that companies allow or guide such consumption behaviors.
Domestic trendy game consumption is becoming more rational, is the blind box fever ebbing?
On the one hand, Bubble Mart's attention began to turn to the foreign fashion play market to "heat" the product.
At the 2021 performance conference, Wang Ning, founder and CEO of Bubble Mart, said that he hoped that overseas revenue could reach 50% of the overall revenue in the future.
According to official website information, Bubble Mart’s overseas business has accelerated in an all-round way this year, and has now entered 23 overseas countries and regions including South Korea, Japan, the United States, Canada, the United Kingdom, and Singapore.
However, the 2021 financial report shows that its overseas sales revenue is 137.4 million yuan, a year-on-year increase of 85.2%, accounting for only 3% of total revenue.
From the perspective of income, there is still a long way to go to get through the sea.
On the other hand, perhaps we should forget about blind boxes, and IP is the core competitiveness.
Wang Ning once said: "We don't think that Bubble's achievements today are just because of the carrier of the blind box. The core element of Bubble Mart's rapid growth is the IP itself." Some people think, "There will be no Bubble Mart after Molly. "It's not unreasonable. The 2021 financial report shows that the revenue share of well-known "C-position" Molly has dropped from 41.6% in 2018 to 15.7% in 2021, which is already the highest income among its own IP.
How to continue to increase the revenue share of last year's own IP 57.6% and exclusive IP 17.2%, and create more long-term influential IP, perhaps the top priority of the blind box company headed by Bubble Mart.
In this regard, Zhang Yi said: "The IP created by Bubble Mart in the past has a certain power, and it can learn from Disney and others to learn from their three-dimensional model of using film and television works and book publishing to drive other products such as toys. Matt has a certain reference value."