author丨Zhang Sainan, intern Huang Xiaoying
editor丨Zhu Yimin
picture source丨Picture insect
has been trapped and bought! A private equity firm in Shanghai has attracted market attention.
Recently, some investors discovered that the top ten circulating shareholders of Bozhong Seiko (688097.SH), a company listed on the Science and Technology Innovation Board , are all products of a private equity company, all of which belong to Shanghai Nantu Asset Management Co., Ltd. (hereinafter referred to as " Nantu Assets").
Investors gathered around and discussed enthusiastically: Who is Nantu Assets, and why do they favor Bozhong Seiko? Is Nantu Assets "trapped" or suspected of "sitting in the bank"? Is this illegal?
On June 22, 21 Century Economic Report reporters called Bozhong Seiko and Nantu Assets respectively to learn about the relevant situation. The relevant person in charge of Bozhong Seiko said, "We are paying attention to this matter, and we think it is a normal investment behavior in the market." Nantu Assets asked the reporter to send an interview email, but there was no reply as of press time.
Chasing all the way to buy
Bozhong Seiko’s first quarter report shows that the company’s top ten circulating shareholders are all funds under Nantu Assets.
The ten funds are Nantu Asset Eslite No. 15, Nantu Asset Eslite No. 7, Nantu Asset Eslite No. 3, Nantu Asset Eslite No. 1, Nantu Asset Eslite No. 10, and Nantu Asset Eslite No. 10. No. 20, Nantu Assets Eslite No. 8, Nantu Assets Eslite No. 16, Nantu Assets Eslite No. 18, Nantu Assets Eslite No. 5, hold a total of 13.5758 million shares, accounting for 13.5758 million shares of Bozhong Precision Industry Co., Ltd. 34.64% of the shares. It is rare for
that the top ten tradable shareholders are all owned by one private equity firm. Many private equity investors told reporters from the 21st Century Business Herald that this matter has been hotly discussed in the industry recently, and it is indeed rare.
Looking back, Nantu Asset’s funds actually appeared on Bozhong Precision’s shareholder list very early.
Bozhong Precision was listed on the Science and Technology Innovation Board in May 2021. The interim report of that year showed that 6 private equity products of Nantu Assets were included in the list of the top ten circulating shareholders, holding a total of 6.754 million shares.
In the third quarter of 2021, the private equity increased its holdings by 1.8 million shares to 8.557 million shares. Among these six private equity products, only Nantu Asset Eslite No. 3 reduced its holdings, and the remaining five all increased their holdings. Nantu Asset Eslite Ten No. 5 rushed to the first place among circulating shareholders.
By the end of 2021, Nantu Asset has launched four new products. At this time, the top ten circulating shareholders of Bozhong Precision have been taken over by Nantu Asset, which holds a total of 11.81 million shares.
In the first quarter of 2022, Nantu Assets continued to increase its holdings of Bozhong Seiko’s stocks. Among them, Nantu Assets Eslite No. 18 newly held 885,200 shares in the first quarter. The remaining 8 private equity products were increasing their holdings, and only 1 The product was slightly reduced.
Combined with the stock price performance of Bozhong Seiko, Nantu Asset’s increase in positions is even more worth pondering. The issue price of
's stock was 11.27 yuan. By the end of the first half of 2021, the stock price had risen to about 30 yuan. On September 8 of that year, the company's stock price reached an all-time high of 57.19 yuan. During the quarter, as the share price of Bozhong Seiko rose, Nantu Asset continued to increase its position.
But entering the fourth quarter, Bozhong Seiko’s stock price began to adjust, once falling back to 35 yuan. At the end of the year, its stock price was hovering around 45 yuan. In other words, during the stock price correction during the period, Nantu Asset continued to "buy, buy, buy" and included the top ten tradable shareholders.
Since the beginning of this year, Bozhong Seiko’s stock price has accelerated its correction, falling to a low of 20 yuan in April. Although it has corrected somewhat since then, it is still below 35 yuan. Taking into account last year's pursuit of high buying, the profitability of these products of Nantu Asset cannot be said to be optimistic. Is
suspected of "taking advantage of the banker"?
According to the official website of Nantu Assets, the private equity was established in 2015 and was registered as the manager of private equity fund that year. It is now an observer member of China Securities Investment Fund Industry Association and has the qualification of tripartite investment advice. The private equity ranking website shows that Nantu’s asset management scale is 2-5 billion yuan and currently has 35 fund products.
In early June this year, Nantu Asset’s aggressive investment style attracted the attention of investors.
Nantu Assets has publicly responded to the media. It said that the company's concentrated purchase of Bozhong Seiko for many products was mainly "out of optimism about the company's fundamentals."Bozhong Seiko is a specialized and innovative enterprise with high R&D investment, high prosperity and high growth. Nantu Asset is strongly optimistic about this enterprise and the Science and Technology Innovation Board market. "Since Bozhong Precision was listed, Nantu Asset has held it for more than one year, and there is no suspicion of so-called stock price manipulation."
Judging from the shareholding ratio, the current total share capital of Bozhong Precision is 403 million shares. The 10 private equity products of Nantu Asset hold a total of 13.5758 million shares, which together hold nearly 35% of Bozhong Precision’s circulating plate . But it does not reach 5% of the total equity of the brand line .
"This situation is rare, but it's actually okay. It's just that it's among the top ten tradable shareholders, and the total total is still lower than the quotation line." A senior private equity person told a reporter from the 21st Century Business Herald.
As for whether he is suspected of "taking the market", the person further said, "Whether he can control the market depends on the trading point of view. This ratio will indeed affect the trend of individual stocks, but as long as he does not trade frequently and does not maliciously go long or short , it is true that It's not illegal. As for buying a stock, as long as the position of the product unit is lower than the contract, it's okay. "
Another private equity person believes that "this situation has its own special characteristics. It has just been a year since the listing, and most of them have not been lifted. The top ten shareholders are relatively concentrated, and the circulation is small. Objectively speaking, the amount of funds of Nantu Asset is not very large. Looking over the long term, after the major shareholders are lifted, the amount of funds will be reduced. The proportion in the circulation is very low, which may also be a manifestation of the special stage. "However, the person also said that this is not done under normal circumstances. "It is too abrupt."
follows the relevant regulatory regulations. It appears that there is no restriction on the concentration of holdings of a single stock by the multiple funds managed by private equity fund managers, nor is there any clear stipulation on the specific share of tradable shares held by private equity funds.
However, as far as Nantu Asset is concerned, it has also been punished for being heavily stocked in a single stock. In November 2021, Nantu Asset received a warning letter from Jiangsu Securities Regulatory Bureau because its holdings of Shihua Technology stocks accounted for more than 5% of the company's total share capital and it failed to stop trading and disclose a report on changes in equity as required.
Continue to increase buying logic
If you regard the bet on Nantu Assets as a normal investment behavior, you might as well return to the target itself and take a look at the quality of Bozhong Seiko.
Bozhong Seiko is engaged in industrial equipment manufacturing equipment system integration . Its main business is the R&D, design, production, sales and technology of automation equipment, automated flexible production lines, key automation components, and tooling clamps (jigs) and other products. Services, business covers consumer electronics, automobiles, new energy and other industries.
has attracted much market attention because of Bozhong Precision's status as a supplier of and for Apple.
In the field of consumer electronics, Bozhong Seiko’s products can be used for -backed sealing rings on mobile phone buttons, back gaskets for mobile phone switches, camera brackets, touch screen components and bottom case assembly, etc. Apple is its largest customer , the equipment and fixtures currently sold by Bozhong Seiko have been used in Apple’s mobile phones, watches, wireless headsets, notebooks, TVs, tablets, smart speakers and after-sales service departments.
Bozhong Seiko’s reliance on major customers once caused market and regulatory attention.
From January to September 2018, 2019 and 2020, the company's sales revenue to Apple accounted for 47.21%, 42.71% and 42.18% of the current operating revenue respectively. At the same time, Apple not only directly signs orders with issuers, but also signs orders with issuers for some products through designated EMS manufacturers. During the reporting period, the company's sales revenue to Apple and its designated EMS manufacturers accounted for the proportion of current operating revenue respectively. 71.82%, 73.31% and 65.37%. The company faces the risk of being dependent on the Apple industry chain.
This means that Bozhong Seiko’s performance will be greatly affected by Apple. And because the company is one of the largest suppliers of automation equipment for the entire assembly process of Apple mobile phones, the revenue recognition situation will be highly correlated with the annual production and release cycle of new iPhones.
For example, in 2018 and 2019, due to the better sales of Apple's iPhoneX models and iPhoneXR models in the previous year, there were more additional orders in the second half of the previous year, which led to acceptance in 2018 and the first quarter of 2019. Received more automation equipment for iPhone. In 2019, as the iPhone 11 product model had minor changes and was not loaded with 5G functions, sales were average, and Apple did not increase demand for equipment in large quantities. From January to March 2020, sales revenue to Apple was small, and mainly consisted of iPads and keyboards. The use of automated equipment on other products has resulted in differences in the equipment models sold to Apple between January and March 2020 compared to the same period last year.
It is worth noting that in 2019, 2020 and 2021, Bozhong Seiko’s net profit has declined for three consecutive years. In 2021, it achieved a net profit of 193.3 million yuan, down more than 30% from before the listing. This kind of profit scale is far from the fruit chain leader of in the A-share market.
A new change is that from the demand side, consumer electronics has fallen into a downturn, and the decline in mobile phone demand has become the market consensus.
Information and Communications Technology Institute data shows that from January to May, the total mobile phone shipments in the domestic market accumulated to 108 million units, a year-on-year decrease of 27.1%, which was 3.2 percentage points smaller than the year-on-year decrease from January to April. International data company IDC predicts that global smartphone shipments will drop 3.5% year-on-year to 1.31 billion units in 2022. Among them, China’s smartphone shipments will drop 11.5% year-on-year.
Coincidentally, Apple's thinking on the industrial chain layout is also changing under the catalysis of the global epidemic. Apple CEO Tim Cook previously said that due to chip supply shortages, international situations and other influences, Apple is considering deploying its supply chain to the United States, Southeast Asia and other regions.
For Bozhong Seiko, which relies heavily on large customers, these are not good news. Nantu Asset, which holds a heavy position in Bozhong Seiko's stocks, needs to re-examine the potential risks faced by its aggressive investment style.
Editor of this issue Jiang Peipei Intern Zhan Huinan
