D. B. Corp Limited (DBCORP) Earnings Call Transcript

Ladies and gentlemen, good day, and welcome to the D.B. Corp Limited Q1 FY '24 Earnings Conference Call. [Operator Instructions] Please note that this conference is being recorded. We have with us today the senior management team of DB Corp Limited. Mr. Pawan Agarwal, Deputy Managing Director; Mr. Girish Agarwaal, Non-Executive Director Mr. Lalit Jain, Chief Financial Officer; Mr. Mushtaq Ali, Vice President, F&A and Mr. Prasoon Kumar Pandey, Head, Investor and DR Relations, who will represent DB Corp Limited on the call. The management will be sharing the key operating and financial highlights for the quarter ended June 30, 2023, followed by a question-and-answer session. Please note that some of the statements made in today's discussion may be forward-looking in nature and may involve risks and uncertainties. Documents relating to the company's financial performance have already been e-mailed to you and are available on the website of the Stock Exchange and the company's Investors section. Trust you have been able to go through the same. I now hand the conference over to Mr. Pawan Agarwal. Thank you, and over to you, sir.

Thank you very much, everyone, and very good evening to everyone, and thank you for joining the Q1 FY 2024 D.B. Corp's earnings conference call. We will begin the call by highlighting the key financial performance for the quarter ended June 30, 2023, followed by key operational updates. We are delighted to announce that we have delivered an impressive performance in the first quarter setting a strong foundation for the commencement of the new financial year. This all-around remarkable growth was on the back of robust ad growth across all segments and cost optimization. In quarter one, FY 2024. Consolidated ad revenue grew 17.2% Y-o-Y to INR 3,946 million from INR 3,368 million in Q1 FY 2023. On the back of increased ad spend, circulation revenue grew by 4% to INR 1,199 million as against INR 1,156 million of Q1 FY 2023. Total revenue grew by 15% Y-o-Y to INR 5,736 million as against INR 4,994 million in Q1 FY 2023. EBITDA grew by 84% Y-o-Y to INR 1,359 million versus INR 738 million in Q1 FY 2023 on account of impressive revenue growth as well as continued cost control, including softening of newsprint prices. During Q1 FY 2024, newsprint prices maintained a downward projected and we expect this trend to continue. We are pleased to report that our average cost for newsprint has decreased from the previous high of INR 63,500 per metric ton in quarter 2 FY 2023 to around INR 56,600 per metric ton in Q1 FY 2024. This reduction in cost provides us with a favorable position and enhances our financial outlook for the future. EBITDA margin expanded by an impressive 900 basis points to 24% from 15% in Q1 FY 2023. PAT for the quarter grew by 154% to INR 788 million versus INR 310 million in Q1 FY 2023. Overall, it has been a very encouraging quarter, and we remain committed to delivering high-quality content and engaging experiences through our print publications, ensuring that our readers continue to find value in Dainik Bhaskar. Moving on to our digital business, which has been a key focus area and an important vertical in terms of future growth for our business. The company has been working hard to increase its loyal monthly active user base across its applications. Our teams continue to work on the digital app to improve the engagement with users and this is helping overall retention of our readers across all formats. Coming to the Radio division in Q1 FY 2024. Revenues grew by 16.2% to INR 372 million versus INR 320 million last year. EBITDA grew by 23% to INR 115 million versus INR 94 million. Through our ongoing initiatives at MY FM, we are working towards building planned visibility, delivering compelling content and which will ultimately drive revenue growth. We remain dedicated to providing the best possible experience for our listeners as well as advertisers as we continue to evolve and thrive in the ever-changing media landscape. With this, I would now request Mr. Girish Agarwal to update us on the operations. Over to you Girish.

Thank you, Pawan, and good evening, everybody, and thank you for joining us on this call. We are pleased to conclude the first quarter of fiscal 2024 with an outstanding performance by our team. Notably, the Indian newspapers industry is witnessing a significant upswing in advertising across various segments. Reputed agencies such as CRISIL peg this growth at about 15% to 17%, Our strong performance reaffirms our position as a key player in the Indian print media industry, and we are excited about the opportunities that lie ahead. It is worthwhile to share here that our print business has registered a growth of strong 24% Y-o-Y for last 5 quarters, if I have to see this year, quarter 1 and the 4 quarters of last year, then this Y-o-Y -- quarter-on-quarter growth is around 24%. Advertisers, including education, real estate, government, jewelry and health have remained steadfast in their preference to use print as their preferred media. In fact, I would like to mention here that during COVID, in the 2 years' time, you were hearing some comments about some advertising, especially real estate and education shifting to digital, but I'm happy to share with you that both these categories have shown a very good growth with us in the last 4 quarters. Furthermore, I'm pleased to share that the Auto Sector advertising is experiencing recovery and we anticipate growth in the forthcoming quarters also. The print media continues to hold value for new age digital sectors also. Lastly, on the cost front, as we have been highlighting, there are tailwinds being created in the form of, a, savings from our cost optimization measures and most importantly, b, benefit from softening of newsprint prices. This favorable trend is expected to yield further more significant benefits in the forthcoming quarters also. As Pawan has just said that new print prices have further up and down. And especially, if you look at the price range, which were earlier at 60-plus has gone down to 56, so I think there is a sizable benefit that just come to us and we expect the same to continue in the headquarters also. This is all from our side and my -- me and my colleagues and I would be very happy to respond to your queries now. Thank you very much.

[Operator Instructions] Thank you. The first question is from the line of Pritesh Chheda from Lucky Investments.

I have 2 questions. One, what was your outlook on the print ad growth for the current fiscal year and next, if you can share that? And my second question is, what is the progress as an industry about the payment -- about the content to be charged through the global apps like Google or Meta -- where I'm seeing globally a couple of countries have actually passed a few bills with regards to that. So any update there would be very helpful.

Sure. So coming to your first question about the growth in the advertising. As I mentioned to you, growth in last 5 quarters have been down 24% Y-o-Y. So if you remember in the Q1 of last year, the number was 99%, but that was because the year before was COVID year. But in Q2 it was 27%; in Q3, 4%; Q4 was 16% and Q4 has been a 15% growth. So considering this trend, I would suggest, I would expect this trend to further improve going forward. Coming to your second question on the social platforms paying for the news content. Industry has already gone to Competition competition (sic) [Commission] of India. They have heard all of us and they are in the process of evaluating the petition. And I'm sure they will soon come out with some positive results.

So, so far, we are not being paid for the content, right?

We have not been paid for content asset, but we have got some kind of remuneration coming from some of the platforms on various other things which we are doing with it.

Okay. Is it the recent revenue generation or it has always been there?

No, its a recent in last 2, 3 quarters started.

And can you quantify that?

If you remember, sir, we took the liberty of asking all our investors not to allow us not to disclose the digital numbers for some more time. Under that, I would request to allow us.

No problem. Thank you very much.

The next question is from the line of Himanshu Upadhyay from O3 PMS.

Congratulations on good set of numbers. See, my question was on the circulation revenue, which is 4% growth, 3.7% Y-o-Y. Can you give some breakup in how much was the growth because of pricing and what was the volume growth rate? Because I think the new revenue, which would be coming to you on the digital because you were doing that subscription experimentation also. So that will answer to come into circulation. So you may not be getting the right impression that on 3.7%. So can you give on the base newspaper? What is the...

Circulation number, just to let you know that in the quarter 1 last year, the circulation number was 41.89%, and this year, it is 42.16%, so there has been almost 1% growth in terms of circulation. That's number one. Number 2 in the cover price from last year, 4.76%, we have gone up to 4.84%. That is another almost 2% growth there. So the 4% growth, which has said come in circulation, 3% has come directly from here on.

Okay. Okay. And secondly, we had stated that last year when the prices were increasing, still it was time for us to raise advertisement pricing, okay? Especially on the newspaper side, okay. But do you think now the time is coming where we can take back the prices what we would have reduced COVID after that.

Yes, it's a very good question, and we, as an organization, are trying our best, and we are seeing certain results also by taking those discounts. Largely, we have taken the discounts back, but I'm saying furthermore, how can we improve the yield, so we all are working towards it.

And in one more thing, the Radio also has done pretty well for us, okay? And the 16% growth in the radio advertisement what we are seeing, is it just occupancy because there was scope to improve the occupancy also.

The large radio growth has come from the occupancy, they have not been able to improve the yield. But in the coming quarter, they are working on it.

And what would be the current utilization in occupancy?

I don't have it [ often ] sir, we can supply you offline.

And just context on the larger thing, okay? Some of the sectors like consumption, okay? What we are seeing is a slowdown, okay, in some of these sectors, our rural is still not doing very much. How are you seeing the business is? Okay, especially FMCG and some of these sectors, are you seeing that advertisement increase. And one important sector for us was Autos, which was not doing well because new models were not coming up and.

As you rightly mentioned, since the rural sector is slightly weak or not that strong, the FMCG advertising with us is slightly soft, it's not improving. So there are a few segments which still need to be ramped up.

In autos, we have seen a lot of new models come up, in last [ June ].

Autos we have shown a growth of almost 30% in this quarter. We believe this will continue in the coming quarters because of the new launches.

Okay. Because it was nowhere in the press release. So I was just [indiscernible] how is it doing. Yes. Thank you.

We'll move on to the next question. That is from the line of Riya from Equitas Investments.

Congratulations, good set of number. I have a couple of questions. So I was just taking the paper price trend. So import prices have been -- have fallen much more than the domestic prices. So do we have the fungibility of increasing import portion for our newsprint?

Generally what happened, Indian newspaper manufacturers, follow the trend of the imported newsprint. On this imported newsprint has gone down from next quarter, you will see Indian newsprint also will be reducing their prices. So there's no need to shift the consumption pattern because they will also come to the same terms.

Okay. And what will be your current blended prices of paper?

This quarter, we have done INR 56,600 per ton.

We've seen continued further trend of reduction.

We expect that another maybe should go down in the next quarter.

Okay. My second question would be with regards to the government has some new pricing policy, which shows suppose to happening? Where are we on that?

Actually, you're asking a wrong person because I have no clue what they are doing. But as of now, from our side, nothing has been done. They have not announced anything to us yet, but I'm sure they must be working on it.

Okay. And what is the government revenue for the current advertisement? What is the kind of growth in are you seeing similar to the...

Our government growth is much higher because if you remember last year, for some reason, certain governments were not advertising with us. And this year, all of them are advertising. So that's the reason why we see this supported growth in the government revenue. But I'm sure from next quarter onwards, that should get annualized number.

So are we back to the time where we didn't have issues, similar revenue in government?

Yes.

And as far as auto, are we back to pre-COVID levels.

So auto is growing. We -- as I mentioned, 30% growth in this quarter, but I think auto has a long way to go.

Okay. And my last question would be [indiscernible] the press release, there's a increase in cover prices in Maharashtra, Bihar, are we going forward or seeing any trend of increase in cover price in other geographies?

Not frankly, speaking, no, because your cover price is already almost INR 4.84, maybe INR 0.03, INR 0.04, INR 0.05 margin because of Maharashtra and Bihar come in, but nothing more.

Okay. So whatever goals going forward will be volume growth, which would be 1% to 2%?

Yes.

And in terms of digital, I have a question that the press release due to the MAUs. In March, our total Dainik Bhaskar group at 14.2 million user. However, the slight decline to 13.4 million. If I just check the trend last January 2022, that was 17.2%. So why are you seeing a decrease in trend?

For 2 reasons. As you remember, last time, we mentioned to you that we are doing certain experiment on monetization in various pockets, number one. Number two, we are also ensuring that during this experiment, we are not doing any kind of promotions and as such because we want to grow and check the number based on 100% organic growth. So that's the reason, slight number here and there, what's the difference you're seeing.

And our experimentation revenue goes in a normal population advertisement?

Yes.

That's it from my side.

Thank you. The next question is from the line of [ Pradyumna Choudhary ] from JM Financial.

Congratulations on a great set of numbers. So my question was primarily more on the newsprint prices side, more on the structural side, not really what is not an even near term. So what I'm trying to understand is what factors determine the newsprint prices? And how volatile like we've seen they've been quite volatile over the years. So what really determines the volatility and longer term what do you see in terms of outlook for the newsprint prices?

As you would understand, newsprint is like a commodity, though it is produced by limited mills, limited buyers but yet directing as a commodity. No one has a control over it and there are multiple factors affecting it. What we saw last year, the dollar price impacting, the Russia-Ukraine were impacting it, the freight fee -- freight going up impacting it. So as of now, what we are saying that all these things are softening down. So hence, the benefit is coming to us. Now going forward, there could be further benefit coming because of some other reasons of some consumption in some other countries going down or some new mill coming up. or the mills those who are making the brown paper shifting into white paper. So there are multiple factors.

But, sir, like if we remove this last couple of years, usually over a longer term, what are the major factors which determine the volatility? And also internationally, which countries supply the newsprint to India, the most, like which are the major contributors?

So Russia is one country, Canada is another country with supplies. South Korea also does it a little bit, Malaysia also supply, so I think it all depends on which company or which mill operating in which country has got more capacity. As you know, most of the newsprint mills have the option to convert into the brown paper also for the packaging industry. At the same time, depending on the demand from their local market also. So I think if you see last 10 years' trend, we cannot say that one country particular mill in that country, continue to supply that kind of quantity. It depends on various internal and external factors.

Okay. And the volatility part, apart from last couple of years where the freight and everything was an issue, the world was an issue. Usually, over the longer term, what other factors determine the newsprint prices? I think in FY 2019, again, the prices have risen a lot. So back then, what was the reason?

Sir, I would -- so largely, what is not to as explained to you. But I think I'll be very happy to engage in our conversation with you on this offline to discuss this topic at more length.

All right. All the best.

The next question is from the line of Riken Ramesh Gopani from [ Capri Global ].

Congratulations for a great set of results. I wanted to firstly understand on the ad growth outlook that you shared. So basically, this quarter, you've seen a 15% plus kind of a growth in the ad revenues. So you see there being an improving because I think one of the other participant has also asked that the consumption is not necessarily showing any very strong trends as of now. So what's your prognosis of the on-ground demand outlook. Of course, sectors like government and so on are showing growth that are unique to us. But otherwise, what's your sense of the overall outlook in terms of demand, if you could maybe elaborate a little better on the advertising piece.

So what is happening in large 3 state of our Madhya Pradesh, Rajasthan and Chhattisgarh, there are state assembly election happening in November of this year. So because of that, all these state governments are ensuring there are a lot of activities happening on the ground. They are offering a lot of benefits to the people of their state and at the same time, doing a lot of CapEx also. Now because of that, obviously, there is a disposable money increase in the market and the [ consumption ] of real estate, education, automobile has gone up in these states. That's what we are noticing. And I think that's the reason why advertisers are advertising and taking this year.

Understood. So in each of these core segments, which is real estate, education, auto, where is it that you are seeing now your overall business growing about past there is significant scope for improvement still compared to where you have seen the peak revenues in the past?

I think automobile, FMCG, real estate are the categories where we believe that there's enough scope for improvement furthermore.

Okay. It's broadly -- and government also is sort of now back to its peak levels in the past? Or it's still quite some time from there?

Yes.

It's there. Okay. So broadly, what I can understand or is fair to assume that overall, at least the trajectory looks either improving or the way you've panned out in the current quarter? Is that a fair assessment of the outlook and growth?

I would agree with you.

Got it. Just one more question that I have, which is on the case related to revenues from the global apps, so if you could throw some more light in terms of where the current cases, what could be the time frame within which any outcome might be reasonable to expect? And specifically from Google, what revenues would we be generating from players like Google today? If you could talk about that?

The case is with the competition commission of India and it will not be prudent on my part to do any kind of comment on that in terms of timing and all that because it is sub judice. Coming to the second point of yours about the revenues of Google and all that, yes, we are getting some kind of revenue from them, for different experiment, what we are doing in terms of advertising and other things with them. As we requested earlier that on the digital front, we have requested all of you to allow us not to disclose the specific number for digital for some time, and you all had agreed at that time. So I would request the same again.

All right, sir. Thank you so much for the answers.

The next question is from the line of Anuj Sharma from M3 Investments.

A few data points. One is what would be the contribution from top 5 segments? And what would be the growth on each of them versus last year?

Our top 5 segments remains the same largely which is education, government, response, real estate, automobile, FMCG. These are the top 5, 6 segments, those who stay with us, and this segment largely contributes almost 65%, 70%, I would say, of the total revenue.