Tag: business

Deel 2022 ARR (Annual Recurring Revenue) Reaches $295 million

Deel is an amazing HR tool that focuses on global payroll and compliance systems.

In 2021 Deel had $50 million in ARR

In 2022 Deel has just announced they had $295 million in ARR (annual recurring revenue).

This also coincides with Deel announcing that they are now at a $12 billion valuation.

In this past 12 months Deel has announced the launch of Deel HR, US Payroll, and Deel Engage, applications for hiring, managing and paying global workers compliantly.

Deel is going to be a company to watch in the HR space for many years to come and if they are going to be acquired they really need be acquired within the next 24 months – otherwise they are going to be too big!

What is Free Cash Flow (FCF) – Definition and Example

Free cash flow (FCF) is a financial metric that measures a company’s ability to generate cash after accounting for capital expenditures. It is an important indicator of a company’s financial health and ability to pay dividends, make acquisitions, and invest in growth opportunities.

FCF is calculated by taking a company’s operating cash flow (OCF) and subtracting capital expenditures (CapEx). OCF is the cash generated from a company’s operations, while CapEx is the cash spent on investments in property, plant, and equipment (PPE).

For example, if a company has an OCF of $100 million and CapEx of $50 million, its FCF would be $50 million. This means the company has $50 million in cash left over after accounting for investments in PPE.

A positive FCF is considered to be a good sign, as it means a company is generating more cash than it’s using in its operations. It also indicates that a company has a strong financial position and is able to pay dividends, make acquisitions, and invest in growth opportunities. On the other hand, a negative FCF is considered to be a red flag, as it means a company is using more cash than it’s generating, and it may indicate financial difficulties.

It’s important to note that FCF is different from net income, which is a measure of a company’s profitability. Net income takes into account a variety of factors such as revenue, expenses, and taxes, while FCF only measures cash flow. Additionally, FCF can also be affected by a company’s accounting methods and may not always reflect the true cash position of the company.

In summary, Free Cash Flow (FCF) is a financial metric that measures a company’s ability to generate cash after accounting for capital expenditures. It is an important indicator of a company’s financial health and ability to pay dividends, make acquisitions, and invest in growth opportunities. Positive FCF is considered to be a good sign, while negative FCF is considered to be a red flag, it’s important to consider it along with other financial metrics and market conditions.

Quick Snowflake Company Overview, Its Current Free Cash Flow (FCF) Position and Why It’s Important

Snowflake is a cloud-based data warehousing company that allows businesses to store, analyze, and share data in real-time. The company’s platform is built on top of the cloud infrastructure provided by Amazon Web Services, Microsoft Azure, and Google Cloud Platform. Snowflake is publicly traded on the New York Stock Exchange under the ticker symbol SNOW.

One important metric for evaluating a company’s financial health is free cash flow (FCF), which is the amount of cash a company generates after accounting for capital expenditures. FCF is important because it shows a company’s ability to generate cash and pay dividends or make acquisitions.

Snowflake has a positive free cash flow position, meaning that it generates more cash than it uses in its operations. In the most recent quarter, Snowflake reported a FCF of $56.6 million, up from $20.2 million in the same quarter last year. This represents a 180% year-over-year growth in FCF.

This strong FCF position has allowed Snowflake to invest in growth initiatives, including expanding its sales and marketing efforts and research and development. The company has also been able to return cash to shareholders through share buybacks.

Snowflake’s financial position has been supported by its subscription-based business model, which provides a steady stream of recurring revenue, and the growing demand for cloud-based data warehousing solutions. The company has also benefited from the shift to remote work and digital transformation as more companies turn to Snowflake’s cloud-based data warehousing solutions.

What’s the Difference Between Berkshire Hathaway A Stock and B Stock?

Berkshire Hathaway is a holding company owned by Warren Buffett and is one of the most successful and well-known businesses in the world. The company has two classes of stock, A and B, and the two stocks have some important differences. In this post, we’ll explore the difference between the two types of stock and what that means for investors.

Class A Stock

Berkshire Hathaway Class A shares are the company’s original stock, and are traded on the New York Stock Exchange under the ticker symbol BRK.A. Class A shares are the most expensive, currently trading around $350,000 per share. The stock is known for its high dividend yield, and investors receive one vote per share when voting at the company’s annual meeting.

Class B Stock

Berkshire Hathaway’s Class B shares are much more affordable, trading around $250 per share. The stock still carries the ticker symbol BRK.B and still pays a dividend, though it is not as high as the Class A stock. In addition, Class B shares only carry one-tenth of the voting power of Class A shares.

Conclusion

Berkshire Hathaway A stock and B stock are two classes of stock offered by the company. Class A stock is the most expensive, but carries more voting power and a higher dividend yield. Class B stock is more affordable and pays a dividend, though it carries much less voting power. Both classes of stock offer investors a chance to benefit from the long-term success of Berkshire Hathaway.

Tencent Music Entertainment Set to List on Hong Kong Stock Exchange in Coming Days

It has been reported that Tencent Music Entertainment will be performing a secondary listing in Hong Kong in the coming days.

China’s TME, home to three of the country’s leading music streaming services; QQ Music, Kugou and Kuwo.

The secondary listing plan was announced by TME Executive Chairman Cussion Pang alongside the firm’s Q4 2021 and FY 2021 results.

This will be a very big listing for the Hong Kong Stock Exchange.

“We are pursuing a secondary listing on the Main Board of the Hong Kong Stock Exchange through a listing by way of introduction (which is a direct listing without any offering of new shares), subject to regulatory approvals,” said Pang.

It will be interesting to see in the coming year if TME also decides to keep their NYSE listing or whether they decide to pull out of the US market.

Kobalt Sells to Francisco Partners (Private Equity) – Loss for Independent Music Industry

It was announced a few days ago that Kobalt has sold to private equity firm – Francisco Partners.

The acquisition was price around $750 million and Francisco Partners acquired 90% of Kobalt. The remaining 10% will be split between Matt Pincus’s MUSIC, plus Dundee Partners and also Willard Ahdritz (founder of Kobalt). (Pincus will join the Board of Kobalt post the deal closing.)

Kobalt has always been the poster child of the independent music industry for music publishing rights. It’s a huge shame to see them sell to private equity instead of trying to push on further and remain an independent firm.

Over time it will be interesting to see if Francisco Partners decides to hold on to Kobalt or look to further offload the assets as they appreciate in value.

Either way… Kobalt has had amazing success over the years and its great to see them in a position where they could potentially grow even further.

p.s. Im very bullish on AMRA

Private Investing vs Public Investing = Tale of Failed IPOs

I posted this on Twitter, but thought I would also share on here as it really showed the difference between private investing and public investing.

Some companies that have market caps less than the total money they have raised:

• Bird ($120M mkt cap vs $1.2B raised)

• Wish ($810M mkt cap vs $2.9B raised)

• WeWork ($2.8B mkt cap vs $16.2B raised)

• Lyft ($5.1B mkt cap vs $7.3B raised)

Cash App Marketing Strategy – Bring in the Hip Hop Culture

I came across this post by – Dan Runcie (Trapital). Great read and started to make a lot of sense in combination with Square (Cash App owners) also buying Tidal.

Research also via – Ark Invest – https://ark-invest.com/articles/analyst-research/squares-cash-app-twitter/

For years, Cash App lagged behind Venmo. But that was before it teamed up with rappers as influencers. Here’s how hip-hop helped Cash App become a $73B+ business.

When Cash App launched in 2013, it was very buttoned-up.

Users needed phone numbers or emails to transfer money. There was no social element. It lost money with every new sign-up.

But in 2015, Cash App introduced $cashtags. In 2017, it followed up with Bitcoin trading just before it hit its first $20k high. The timing was perfect.

With its crypto users generating 3x more revenue than non-crypto users, Cash App wanted to double down on its influence.

At the time, Cash App started getting more shoutouts in rap songs. The company wasn’t sure why, but Block, Cash App’s parent company, locked in on one of the more successful influencer campaigns in recent years.

In May 2018, Cash App teamed up with Lil’ B. That August, Travis Scott came on board. And in December of that year, Snoop Dogg was its newest partner.

With Cash App as a sponsor, these artists gave away $100-$500 to fans who posted their $cashtag under their posts.

Cash App’s hip-hop influencer giveaways worked for four reasons:

1. Low customer acquisition cost (CAC)

2. Free money is always an easy sell

3. This was the first time hip-hop fans were the target audience for a financial service

4. It built on its existing popularity

Let’s break those down.

1. Low CACs

ARK Invest had a great breakdown on how Cash App’s hip-hop influencer tactics drop its CAC to be as low as $20 per user.

As a comparison, traditional banks spend $925 per user.

2. Free money is an easy sell

In 2019, the company spent an estimated $60k on Cash App Fridays, an investment that paid for itself many times over. Cash App Fridays became an awareness-building tactic in itself.

3. Reaching different customers

Cash App’s user base is strongest in the South and the Midwest of the US, which aligns with the regions where many hip-hop fans live.

Historically, these regions also get ignored by traditional banks.

By targeting these areas, Cash App took an approach opposite to most startups who instead focus on their “early adopter” coastal elite networks in NY, SF, LA, and DC.

Unlike Venmo, which relied on Ivy League students and alumni for initial growth.

4. Built on existing popularity

Cash App has now been name-dropped by 200+ hip-hop artists.

Sponsoring artists to give away hundreds of thousands led to more peer-to-peer transactions, which attracted more of its most profitable demographic, Bitcoin investors.

Cash App leaned into its popularity even more when it launched Cash App Studios in 2021 to bankroll artists and other creatives.

Cash App has achieved every modern brand’s dream: To become part of the ‘culture’ without appropriating it.

Beggars Music Group Financials for 2021 – Revenues up 29.7% Year on Year

Beggars Music Group had a strong 2021 (as they have just released their numbers in a filing on UK Companies House).

Beggars Group generated GBP 79.98 million in 2021 – which was up 29.7% year on year.

This figure includes Beggars’ share of various joint venture businesses including XL Recordings, Matador and Rough Trade, in each of which Beggars owns 50%.

Beggars is a huge player in independent music market and it’s great to see that they are still growing strong and getting a strong slice of the market.

Creating a Brand is Hard and It Takes at Least 5 Years!

The other day we official launched RouteNote Create under the RouteNote umbrella.

RouteNote Create was originally intended to be a standalone product – but I learnt a lot about starting a brand over the past 12 months and it is getting harder and harder with time to build meaningful brands online. The landscape and places you need to be visible are getting larger and larger and it’s very difficult trying to keep them all up to date and heading in the same direction with the same branding, tone of voice and message.

Note to self – If you are going to build a brand – then make sure it focuses on a new customer type and expect it to take at least 5 years to really show fruit!

Im Tired of YouTube Investment “Gurus”

There are so many investment “gurus” on YouTube and it simply just feels like this is now a step above a used car salesman!

Here is a very good example – Investment Advice! When he simply just adds his money into a very basic Vanguard ETF based off the S&P500.

This is probably as far as it gets from someone who should actually be giving investment advice!

What you really should be watching is video interviews from Warren Buffett – and then also spending a huge amount of time reading and working out your own way to value companies and their intrinsic value.

SWIFT Network Restrictions Could Cripple Russia in the Ukraine War

I came across this information about SWIFT network posted the other day. This could have a very big impact on the Russian and Ukraine war and instead of trying to put it in my own words I thought I would repost it.

Following Russia’s invasion of Ukraine, Western governments have dropped heavy sanctions on Russian banks, companies, and elites—including President Vladimir Putin himself.

But they’ve yet to move forward with what’s been called the “nuclear option”: banning Russia from using SWIFT.

What is SWIFT?

Belgium’s Society for Worldwide Interbank Financial Telecommunications (SWIFT) runs a messaging service that facilitates transactions across 11,000+ financial institutions globally. Think of it as the “Gmail of global banking.”

Entities in every country except North Korea use SWIFT to shuffle trillions of dollars’ worth of funds across borders. And Russia is a SWIFT power user—as a major supplier of energy and other goods, it ranks sixth globally for payment messages sent on SWIFT. So if Russia were cut off from SWIFT, “the nation would essentially be severed from much of the global financial system,” the NYT wrote.

Thing is, not everyone’s prepared for that

While the UK and Ukraine are trying to boot Russia from the global group chat, the US and some EU nations are a little more hesitant. Here’s why:

  1. They’re not ready to go full James Franco in 127 Hours. Their citizens still use Russian energy to keep the lights on, so shutting down Russia’s Gmail account would essentially force financial communications onto a janky platform like 1990s-era AOL, resulting in a colossal headache for everyone involved.
  2. Another worry for the US is how blocking Russia from SWIFT would impact the dominance of the US dollar in the longer term. The US enjoys many benefits from the dollar’s status as the world’s reserve currency, and US officials are concerned that booting Russia from SWIFT would spur Moscow to join up with Beijing and develop alternative payment systems (on the blockchain, for instance) that undermine the dollar.

Of course, workarounds to SWIFT already exist, which is another reason why some sanctions experts say that blocking SWIFT access is an overrated tool for punishing Russia. You could do it, but you might be creating more problems for yourself in the process.

Shareholders Need to Behave Like Owners – Warren Buffett

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=r4HZHrcm6mY

Very interesting question to Warren Buffett – in which he then provides a very interesting (yet simplistic) answer.

Shareholders need to act like owners – and in nearly all cases in America – this is forgotten. People forget that when they buy a stock in a business that they are becoming an owner in that business.

Tencent Sells Giant Stake in JD.com – Dropping its ECommerce Share

Tencent is a giant in the world of Chinese technology and beyond. Today they have announced that they will be selling most of its stake in JD.com.

Tencent will reduce is staking from 17% to 2.3%.

The proceeds will help Tencent provide shareholders with a $16.4 billion dividend.

After long being JD’s largest stakeholder, Tencent will give the title to Walmart.

This seems to be a Tencent strategy that has paid off in the long term. Instead of Tencent looking to acquire many companies in adjacent industries – they have decided to acquire minority stakes in a huge number of technology companies globally.

Why?

Its far easy to own more when you own a minority. If Tencent were to acquire more companies – they would have issues with Government and regulator approval.