Monday 30 January 2017

Analysis of Keek's Q3 results

Keek (KEEKF) (KEK.V) posted its financial results and MD&A on SEDAR. Here are my thoughts and/or highlights of what I find to be the most important issues:

  • There is a line in the MD&A which states: "The Offer Box is currently in development and deployment to the Peeks service is now expected during the 2018 fiscal year." At first I had a WTF moment, until I realized that fiscal 2017 ends this February. Fiscal 2018 runs from March 2017 to February 2018. My best guess is that we're probably looking at a March-April timeline, but Mark Itwaru is keeping his cards close to him this time, and not giving us a more definite timeline.
  • The iOS disruption details are as follows: "On January 16, 2016, the iOS version of the Peeks app was removed from the App Store by Apple. The iOS app was deemed to be non-compliant with Apple’s App Review Guidelines, specifically in that it required improvements to control the display of user generated content of a mature nature, and the addition of in-app purchase capabilities. The removal of the iOS version from the App Store has caused a significant negative impact on new registrations and the general growth of the platform. The Company expects the iOS version to be available again in the very near future. The Company expects that growth rates across all metrics will be restrained until such time as a new iOS version can be released to the public. Should that require an extended period of time, the Peeks service may see a period of decline in user activity. However, in the week following Apple’s decision, it is estimated that transactions on the service had still increased approximately 40% as compared to the last week of December 2016."  
  • The bad news - the company is non-committal over the timing that the iOS issue will be resolved. There is also some ambiguity around the "in-app purchase" capabilities. One shareholder and I have been discussing Apple's TOS for developers and if paid streams constitute an in-app purchase and are therefore subject to going through Apple's payment systems. The good news - even without Apple the disruption was temporary. Transactions are still up 40% versus the last week of December.
  • Revenue was $6,810, split evenly between ad revenue and tipping revenue. This covers only the first few weeks of Peeks being live in November, so this low amount doesn't worry me.
  • Total opex was $1,520K. This includes $850K of stock compensation expense. Excluding this number, as well as the gain on disposal of a long lived asset (-$67K), FX impact ($26K) and amortization ($20K) leads to $691K in cash costs for the quarter. This is $230K a month, or slightly over the $150-$175K the company has previously forecasted. It's not egregiously over budget, but I think with the growth of the app, we can expect hiring so I don't think this forecast is applicable any more. However, I expect revenue to more that offset that in the future. 
  • The company made excellent progress in paying down its trade payables, as evidenced by a gain on the settlement of debts of $592K. In the subsequent events section, the company settled another $449K of payables for $161K, netting a gain of $288K. 501K of options and warrants with a strike price of $0.30 were exercised since November 30th, improving the balance sheet some more going forward. This is a smaller amount than I would have expected, so selling pressure hasn't come from warrant exercises.
  • No ARPU number, but I really like this paragraph in the MD&A: "Through December 2016 and into January 2017 the Peeks service saw significant growth across all aspects of the service including in the percent of transacting users and the number of transactions. On November 30, 2016, approximately 1.4% of registered Peeks users had a credit card associated with their Peeks account. By December 31, 2016, this number had increased to approximately 3.4%, and by January 15, 2016, had increased to approximately 6.0%. Similarly, the estimated daily average aggregate dollar amount of user transactions on the Peeks service (tipping and purchasing of paid broadcasts) in the last week of December was approximately 1,000% of the daily average in November 2016."
  • Revenue share to Peeks was 45% of all tips. Keek is entitled to 30% of that, or 13.5% of all tips generated in November. If Keek earned $3,400 in tips, the gross amount of tips on the Peeks platform for the period ending November was $25,000.
  • Using the above as a guide, if total tips were $25,000 for the month of November and by the end of December the run rate was 10 times that, that's $250,000 in tips generated on the platform. Judging by anecdotal evidence and observations collected by shareholders from a couple of weeks ago (~$20K tips/day), third party app usage stats and the credit card information presented above (6.0% vs. 3.4%), it looks like mid-January was 2-3x more active than the end of December. Note that the $250,000 run rate I calculate at the end of December ($8,000 a day) is quite aligned to anecdotal observations made by KEK investors on the Facebook investor group around that time ($5,000-$6.000 a day). However, this was prior to the Apple issue. The company claims that by the end of January that transactions were still up 40% over December. That would mean the run rate would be $350,000 without Apple. Probably around $700,000 with Apple once it does get back online.
  • If Peeks has averaged $300,000 in tips a month for December and January and if the revenue share stays steady at 13.5%, that would mean KEK earned $80,000 in total revenue for the two months. The run-rate of $350,000 means that KEK is at a $47,000 monthly revenue run rate heading into February. 
These are my observations after a quick look at the MD&A and financial statements. I may have more observations after reading this material again and letting it sink in. 

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