Tuniu Corp

NASDAQ:TOUR

Earnings Call Analysis

Tuniu's Surging Revenue Growth

In 2023, Tuniu saw net revenues skyrocket to RMB 441.3 million, a 140% jump from the previous year, driven by a resurgence in package tours which surged 374% and accounted for 76% of the total revenue. Gross profit increased by a staggering 228% reaching RMB 293.7 million. Despite a 509% surge in operating expenses due to a goodwill impairment of RMB 114.7 million, non-GAAP net income stood at RMB 52.6 million. The company generated RMB 253.3 million in operating cash flow. Looking forward to Q1 2024, Tuniu anticipates a revenue increase of 60% to 70% year-over-year.

A Remarkable Year for Package Tours Drives Revenue Growth

Throughout the fourth quarter of 2023, Tuniu Corporation has witnessed an exceptional 266% surge in revenue compared to the same period in the previous year, with notable earnings of RMB 99.9 million. This impressive growth is largely attributed to the recovery of the travel market and a staggering 1,377% increase in package tour revenues, which now constitute 73% of the company's total revenue. The narrative for the full fiscal year is similarly uplifting, with a 140% jump in net revenues to RMB 441.3 million, again fueled by the package tour segment, which ballooned by 374% to RMB 333.4 million.

Goodwill Impairment Impacts Expenses and Earnings

Despite significant revenue growth, Tuniu Corporation faced a year-over-year operating expense escalation of 509% in Q4 and 32% for the full year, primarily due to a whopping RMB 114.7 million goodwill impairment recorded in Q4. This resulted in a GAAP net loss of RMB 132.3 million for the quarter, although non-GAAP net income was positive at RMB 6.2 million, which excludes various non-cash expenses such as share-based compensation and the aforementioned goodwill impairment.

Cost-Efficient Operations Reflect in Decreasing Expense Ratios

Cost management appears effective as presented in the reduced expense ratios. Research and development expenses dropped to 10% of net revenues, a significant decrease from 40% in the previous year, while sales and marketing, as well as general and administrative expenses, also declined as a percentage of net revenues. This efficient expenditure management is reflective of a more sustainable business model, positioning Tuniu well for future growth.

Strong Balance Sheet with Robust Cash Position

By the end of 2023, Tuniu maintains a healthy financial position with RMB 1.2 billion in cash and cash equivalents, restricted cash, and short-term investments. This robust liquidity status, paired with a cash flow of RMB 253.3 million generated from operations during the year, suggests a solid foundation for both ongoing operations and future investments.

Forward-Looking Guidance Signifies Continued Revenue Uplift

Looking ahead to the first quarter of 2024, Tuniu projects further growth, forecasting net revenues to reach between RMB 101.1 million and RMB 107.4 million, a remarkable 60% to 70% increase year-over-year. This optimistic guidance reflects the company's confidence in the sustained recovery of the travel market and the effectiveness of its strategic business initiatives.

Earnings Call Transcript 2023-Q4

[Operator]

Hello, and thank you for standing by for Tuniu's 2023 Fourth Quarter and Full Year Earnings Conference Call. [Operator Instructions] Today's conference is being recorded. If you have any objections, you may disconnect at this time. I would now like to turn the meeting over to your host for today's conference call, Director of Investor Relations, Mary.

[Mary Chen, executive]

Thank you. and welcome to our 2023 Fourth Quarter and Full Year Earnings Conference Call. Joining me on the call today are Donald Yu, Tuniu's Founder, Chairman and Chief Executive Officer; and Anqiang Chen, Tuniu's Financial Controller. For today's agenda, management will discuss business updates, operation highlights and financial performance for the fourth quarter and fiscal year 2023.

Before we continue, I refer you to our safe harbor statement in the earnings press release, which applies to this call as we will make forward-looking statements. Also, this call includes discussions of certain non-GAAP financial measures. Please refer to our earnings release, which contains a reconciliation of non-GAAP measures to the most directly comparable GAAP measures. Finally, please note that unless otherwise stated, all figures mentioned during this conference call are in RMB.

I would now like to turn the call over to our Founder, Chairman and Chief Executive Officer, Donald Yu.

[Dunde Yu, executive]

Thank you, Mary. Good day, everyone. Welcome to our fourth quarter and full year 2023 earnings conference call. Tuniu delivered a strong performance in the fourth quarter of 2023 with net revenues growing year-over-year by 266%, including 1,377% increase in revenues from package tours. Gross profit increased by 512% year-over-year, and we achieved non-GAAP profitability for the third consecutive quarter. 2023 was a significant year of recovery for the travel industry following the pandemic with a robust rebound in the domestic travel market.

We saw a dramatic increase in travel demand during China's national holidays and summer occasions amid the emergence of many popular destinations and attractions. In terms of outbound travel, the number of newly opened up destination countries increased from 20 at the beginning of the year to 138 by the end of the fourth quarter. Countries like Thailand and Singapore introduced favorable visa policies, helping to boost the recovery of the outbound travel market.

We are pleased with our performance for the full year 2023. Our net revenues increased by 140% year-over-year. Revenues from package tours increased by 374% and gross profit increased by 228%. We also achieved our first full year profitability on a non-GAAP basis since the pandemic. With non-GAAP net income approaching RMB 51 million, the highest since our listing. In 2023, pent-up travel demand was released with the relaxation of travel restrictions. However, the tourism supply chain, especially the supply chain relating to the outbound travel market was impacted during the pandemic. In response, our priority was to recover and rebuild the supply chain to promptly provide products to meet customer demand.

Leveraging Tuniu's rich experience in the industry and our continuous efforts to maintain relationships during the pandemic, our procurement and product teams have been able to rapidly rebuild our portfolio, our products by sourcing high-quality resources from hotels, airlines and local tour operators. For example, as one of Tuniu's star destinations, the Maldives was among the first batch of countries to open up for outbound travel as last February. As one of our earliest launched outbound travel products, in the first quarter of last year, Maldives' tours have already surpassed RMB 10 million in sales volumes.

Tuniu's core competitiveness is our commitment to providing high-quality products and services to our customers. Amidst the strong demand post the pandemic, we continue to adhere to our strict standards for product procurement and development, and increasingly reach the bar in terms of product and service quality. For instance, for our in-house Niu Tour products, we require our product personnel to work closely at the destination and actively coordinate with local tour operators on resource procurement, tour guide management and quality control.

Additionally, we conduct quality inspections during organized tours to promptly identify and resolve issues. As a result, the average customer satisfaction rate for our Niu Tour products has been continuously increasing from slightly over 90% to 97%, and reached over 98% during the summer of 2023. And at the same time, we prioritize the customer experience by addressing pain points during the trip.

Beginning last year, Niu Tour introduced the zero shopping itinerary, ensuring no visits to shopping venues throughout the entire journey, which have been very well received. For instance, our zero shopping tour to Bali was launched in December last year, and nearly 40 tours were conducted as of the end of this February, with a satisfaction rate of 100%.

Additionally, since 2023, Niu Tour has commenced, offering exclusive services, where a dedicated service personnel establishes a WeChat group prior to the trip to ensure seamless support throughout the journey. Furthermore, we established more collaboration with suppliers to increase the diversity of our products. To ensure customer satisfaction, we maintain our focus on quality control through implementing strict supplier selection process. The satisfaction rate for product launches has reached 90%. And we have introduced a new [ machine ] exam where products receiving highly negative reviews are promptly removed from our offerings.

We also handle customer complains about supplier products in the same way as our in-house products. That is to say we prioritize problem resolution and [ direct ] compensation seeking customers on behalf of suppliers. Additionally, we provide maximum assistance to our partners by granting them access to our inventory management systems to improve their efficiency. We also offer support and advice for product development and improvement for our partners, collectively striving to provide customers with more and better products.

Looking now to our sales efforts. As you know, our professional customer service team has always been one of Tuniu's core advantages. After the pandemic, we didn't directly expand customer service staff in the face of increased demand. Instead, we utilized automation technology to help our customer service teams improve efficiency. We also focus on talent development, particularly for overseas destinations, to help our staff become more familiar with destinations and products and enhanced work efficiency and service quality.

In 2023, the number of our customer service staff increased by over 50% year-over-year, while our net revenues increased by 140%. In addition to individual customers, we also sell corporate clients, offering services such as group travel for companies and personnel travel for corporate employees. In the fourth quarter, with the arrival of the year-end season company annual meetings, team building activities and incentive vacation trips becoming increasingly popular, leading to the small pick in corporate clients travel demand.

In the fourth quarter of 2023, the GMV from corporate clients increased by over 40% compared to the previous quarter. Live streaming emerged as new -- as a new sales channel for us following the pandemic. In 2023, the total payment volume from all Tuniu's live streaming channels exceeded RMB 1 billion, and our now streaming channels also achieved profitability for the full year. On the supply side, we received the Douyin [ Annual ] Star Merchants, a recognition based on comprehensive evaluation of our business volume and the product quality.

Additionally, we established our own MCN agency to further develop and promote our accumulated live streaming capabilities and experiences. We have secured partnerships with more than a 100 external influences, with a total fan base exceeding 4 million. Moreover, in response to market demand this year, we will further strengthen the sales and promotion of our outbound travel products as well as high-quality in-house products such as Niu Tour via live streaming channel.

Also, we continue to enhance the application of system automation in live streaming activities, such as online product verification to lower cost and improve live streaming channel profitability. In 2023, we also strengthened our offline channels by establishing more offline stores. We opened more than 150 offline stores primarily located in second and third tier cities as well as provincial capitals. These stores expand the sales channels for our in-house products and help to promote the Tuniu brands. We will continue to establish and develop our offline stores this year.

In terms of technology, we are committed to leveraging tours to replace simple, repetitive, manual labor to liberate our employees to participate in more compact and accretive work, thereby enhancing our overall operational efficiency. In 2023, we have completed the application of system automation across various sales process, such as marketing, booking and order processing, and have started to integrate it into supply chain management. We are sharing the benefits brought by automation in inventory, pricing and marketing management with our partners. This year, we will also focus on the application of technology in production and services, such as utilizing dynamic packaging systems to generate self-guided tours that enrich our product offerings.

In conclusion, the travel industry saw substantial recovery last year and the positive growth momentum continued into the beginning of 2024. The Spring Festival travel this year was remarkable. We remain optimistic about the development of the travel market this year, especially with the resumption of flights, relaxation of visa policies and the further enhanced supply chain. We still offer significant growth opportunities for the outbound travel market. Outbound travel is one of Tuniu's core advantages, and we will seize the opportunity to provide more and better products and achieve further revenue recovery. At the same time, we will continue to implement our strict cost control measures to enhance our profitability.

I will now turn the call over to Anqiang Chen, our Financial Controller, for the financial highlights.

[Anqiang Chen, executive]

Thank you, Donald. Hello, everyone. Now I will walk you through our fourth quarter and fiscal year 2023 financial results in greater detail. Please note that all the monetary amounts are in RMB, unless otherwise stated. You can find the U.S. dollar equivalents of the numbers in our earnings release.

Starting from the fourth quarter of 2023. Net revenues were RMB 99.9 million in the fourth quarter of 2023, representing a year-over-year increase of 266% from the corresponding period in 2022. The increase was primarily due to the growth of package tours and the travel market recovers. Revenues from package tours were up 1,377% year-over-year to RMB 73.4 million and accounted for 73% of total net revenues for the quarter.. The increase was primarily due to the growth of organized tours.

Other revenues were up 19% year-over-year to RMB 26.6 million and accounted for 27% of our total net revenues. The increase was primarily due to the growth in commission fees received from other travel-related products. Gross profit for the fourth quarter of 2023 was RMB 74.6 million, up 512% year-over-year. Operating expenses for the fourth quarter of 2023 were RMB 198 million, up 509% year-over-year. The increase was primarily due to the impairment of goodwill of RMB 114.7 million recorded in the fourth quarter of 2023.

Research and product development expenses for the fourth quarter of 2023 were RMB 10.4 million, down 5% year-over-year. The decrease was primarily due to the decrease in research and product development personnel-related expenses. Research and product development expenses as a percentage of net revenues were 10%, down from 40% during the same period last year. Sales and marketing expenses for the fourth quarter of 2023 were RMB 33.2 million, up 45% year-over-year. The increase was primarily due to the increase in promotion expenses.

Sales and marketing expenses as a percentage of net revenues were 33% and down from 84% during the same period last year. General and administrative expenses for the fourth quarter of 2023 were RMB 42.1 million, up 27% year-over-year. The increase was primarily due to the employment of property and equipment net recorded in the fourth quarter of 2023. General and administrative expenses as a percentage of net revenues were 42%, down from 121% during the same period last year. Net loss attributable to ordinary shareholders of Tuniu Corporation was RMB 132.3 million in the fourth quarter of 2023.

Non-GAAP net income attributable to ordinary shareholders of Tuniu Corporation, which excluded share-based compensation expenses, amortization of acquired intangible assets, [ impairment ] of goodwill and impairment of property and equipment net was RMB 6.2 million in the fourth quarter of 2023. As of December 31, 2023, the company had cash and cash equivalents, restricted cash and short-term investments of RMB 1.2 billion. Capital expenditures for the fourth quarter of 2023 were RMB 1.3 million.

Now moving to full year 2023 results. In 2023, net revenues were RMB 441.3 million representing a 140% year-over-year increase. The increase was primarily due to the growth of package tours as the travel market recovers. Revenues from package tours were up 374% year-over-year to RMB 333.4 million, and accounted for 76% of our total net revenues in 2023. The increase was primarily due to the growth of organized tours. Other revenues were down 5% year-over-year to RMB 107.9 million and accounted for 24% of our total net revenues in 2023. The decrease was primarily due to the decrease in revenues generated from financial services.

Gross profit was RMB 293.7 million in 2023, up 228% year-over-year. Operating expenses were RMB 395.6 million in 2023, up 32% year-over-year. Research and product development expenses were RMB 57 million in 2023, up 12% year-over-year. The increase was primarily due to the increase in research and product development personnel-related expenses. Research and product development expenses as a percentage of net revenues were 13% in 2023, down from 28% of the previous year. Sales and marketing expenses were RMB 117.7 million in 2023, up 14% year-over-year. The increase was primarily due to the increase in promotion expenses.

Sales and marketing expenses as a percentage of net revenues were 27% in 2023, decreasing from 56% of the previous year. General and administrative expenses were RMB 113.2 million in 2023, up 4% year-over-year. The increase was primarily due to the impairment of property and equipment net recorded in 2023. General and administrative expenses as a percentage of net revenue were 26% in 2023, decreasing from 59% of the previous year.

Net loss attributable to ordinary shareholders of Tuniu Corporation was RMB 99.3 million in 2023. Non-GAAP net income attributable to ordinary shareholders of Tuniu Corporation which excluded share-based compensation expenses, amortization of acquired intangible assets, impairment of goodwill and impairment property and equipment net was RMB 52.6 million in 2023. Cash flow generated from operations for 2023 was RMB 253.3 million. Capital expenditures were RMB 10.2 million in 2023.

For the first quarter of 2024, Tuniu expects to generate RMB 101.1 million to RMB 107.4 million of net revenues, which represents a 60% to 70% increase year-over-year compared with net revenues in the corresponding period in 2023. Please note that these forecasts reflect Tuniu's current and preliminary review on the industry and its operations, which is subject to change. Thank you for listening. We are now ready for your questions. Operator?

[Operator]

[Operator Instructions] And our first question comes from Rita Lee, a private investor.

[Unknown Attendee]

First of all, congratulations on achieving a profitable year. Generally speaking, the financial performance is good. But for the fourth quarter, we see a GAAP net loss. Could you please specify the core causes? And another question is about this year's outlook. Can you share any strategic plan in both business and finance?

[Dunde Yu, executive]

Thank you for the questions. For the fourth quarter last year, we achieved a non-GAAP profitability for the third consecutive quarter. It's also the first time since our listing that we achieved profitability in the fourth quarter, which is off season. Well, on a GAAP basis, we still incurred net loss this quarter. The main difference between GAAP and non-GAAP results is that we recorded over RMB 100 million of goodwill impairment in the GAAP results. This is a financial treatment based on assets required by U.S. GAAP.

We conducted the assessment at year-end comparing the company's net assets with the market value. When the market value is lower, impairment will be triggered. However, given our rapid business recovery, improved profitability as well as positive operating cash flow for the full year, we believe our share price is undervalued. So we proposed a share buyback plan of repurchasing up to USD 10 million worth of shares on open market, which was approved by our Board. We have faith in the continuous growth of both travel industry and our company and we want to deliver this confidence to the public while announcing our past year achievements as well as New Year resolution.

Turning to the plans for 2024. Firstly, we will continue to focus on the development of our in-house product -- Tuniu, high-quality in-house products are our protective mode and differentiated Tuniu from platform OTA. Moreover, for Tuniu brand products such as Niu Tour, we have the pricing power. So new tours contribute steadily to both our revenues and profits. This year, we have continued to increase both SKUs and revenue contribution of new tours.

For example, we'll develop more small group and private group tours in Niu Tour service catering for current demand trends. These tours really contain 2 to 8 people and are more flexible than traditional organized tours. For example, customers in the same group may choose different airlines and even hotels, and the price of these tours is lower than customized tours. These tours are favored by young people and families. Secondly, we will continue to expand our sales channels such as live streaming and offline stores. These channels are good complement to traditional online channels such as app and website. Live streaming is popular among young people, while offline stores can better serve senior citizens.

Furthermore, compared with traditional online channels, live streaming and offline stores provide more interactions between customers and our tour advisers, creating more sales opportunities. So for live streaming, we'll consolidate our position in Douyin at both sales and supply chain this year, introducing more and better products to the market. We are also trying to expand to more platforms such as Little Red Book and our [indiscernible]. For offline stores, we will continue to explore opportunities in lower-tier cities.

Lastly, to better serve our customers, we'll improve our services for other travel-related products such as air tickets and hotels. For example, we provided no funding to any air tickets, which simplifies the booking process, making the experience at Tuniu more convenient and enjoyable. We also restart our special offered air ticket channel, providing discount tickets for our customers. For hotels, we will increase the level of direct procurement to enhance the competitiveness of our hotels.

In terms of financial performance, in the first quarter, we expect 60% to 70% year-over-year increase in our net revenues. We will try to maintain a higher than industry average growth rate for this year. We also continue to increase our profitability and create more values to our shareholders. Thank you.

[Operator]

[Operator Instructions] There are no further questions at this time. I will now turn the call over to Tuniu's Director of Investor Relations, Mary, for closing remarks.

[Mary Chen, executive]

Once again, thank you for joining us today. Please don't hesitate to contact us if you have any further questions. Thank you for your continued support, and we look forward to speaking with you in the coming months.

[Operator]

Thank you for your participation in today's conference. This concludes the presentation, and you may now disconnect.