Focus Media - the key post: Four interpretations of the accounts

Focus Media is - on the published accounts - a very profitable company. It has 63 percent margins gross margins and net margins over 30 percent (all cash returns) in a business where industry comparable net margins are generally substantially lower.

However, over time, Focus Media has taken some enormous write-downs. Here are the five year profit and loss accounts:

	For the years ended December 31
		2007				2008				2009				2010				2011
		(In thousands of U.S. Dollars, except share and per share data)
Selected Consolidated Statements of Operations Data:
Net revenues:(1)
LCD displays		$	184,643			$	244,540			$	208,799			$	297,642			$	444,365
In-store			27,444				60,719				30,346				37,777				56,374
Poster frame(2)			85,472				146,751				98,962				121,893				185,449
Movie theatre			5,259				10,335				9,436				18,095				50,835
Traditional outdoor billboard			32,046				66,843				49,621				40,908				55,597
Total net revenues			334,864				529,188				397,164				516,315				792,620
Cost of revenues:
LCD displays			52,648				80,451				76,418				67,513				85,847
In-store			23,502				61,834				24,170				23,432				20,582
Poster frame(2)			28,086				59,815				95,401				84,487				110,370
Movie theatre			2,941				6,598				7,063				13,849				25,753
Traditional outdoor billboard			25,555				50,346				38,022				32,409				47,092
Total cost of revenues			132,732				259,044				241,074				221,690				289,644
Gross profit			202,132				274,144				156,090				294,625				502,976
Operating expenses:
General and administrative			42,452				79,162				88,833				79,760				127,013
Selling and marketing			53,523				82,258				79,787				103,722				147,717
Impairment loss			—				377,629				63,646				5,736				—
Other operating expenses (income), net			(7,615	)			183,113				13,111				(14,144	)			(16,138	)
Total operating expenses			88,360				722,162				245,377				175,074				258,592
Income (loss) from operations			113,772				(452,018	)			(89,287	)			119,551				244,384
Investment loss			—				—				—				1,288				—
Interest income			9,239				7,130				4,946				7,260				15,539
Interest expense			17				—				—				—				717
Income (loss) from continuing operations before income taxes			122,994				(444,888	)			(84,341	)			125,523				259,206
Income taxes			5,912				25,278				13,780				22,336				54,761
Loss from equity method investee			—				—				—				—				43,633
Net income (loss) from continuing operations			117,082				(470,166	)			(98,121	)			103,187				160,812
Net income (loss) from discontinued operations, net of tax			28,048				(300,672	)			(111,612	)			83,078				—
Net income (loss)			145,130				(770,838	)			(209,733	)			186,265				160,812
Less: Net income (loss) attributable to noncontrolling interests			694				(150	)			3,524				1,991				(1,865	)
Net income (loss) attributable to Focus Media Holdings Limited Shareholders		$	144,436			$	(770,688	)		$	(213,257	)		$	184,274			$	162,677

I want you (dear readers) to study these as they are key to the whole Focus Media story and this is the key post in this sequence.

In 2008 for instance Focus Media had gross profit of $274 million. But it also had an impairment loss of 377.6 million and other operating expenses (associated with discontinued businesses) of a further 183 million. On top of this it had a loss of 300.7 million from discontinued operations.

This wound up in the small manner of USD770.7 million in loss for the year.

I stand to be corrected but that is one of the largest losses ever incurred by a public company in China. Whatever - it is a very big number.

Write downs and losses from discontinued operations were a feature of 2009 as well.

The profits and losses (just taken from the above table) over the last five years are as follows:

2007 - USD 144.4 million
2008 - USD 770.7 million LOSS
2009 - USD 213.3 million LOSS
2010 - USD 184.3 million
2011 - USD 162.7 million

The aggregate profit for Focus Media over five years is a net loss of over half a billion dollars.

This is very strange. Focus Media is a hyper-profitable business that makes huge losses.

They made these losses on businesses that they have purchased and disposed of (at a loss) and businesses that they have purchased and discontinued after operating losses.

Some of the disclosures regarding the disposals are unusual. For instance there are many instances I can find of a company being purchased for a lot of money and then given back to the original owners (see the discussion of 2009 dispositions for a few examples).

When a business is purchased for a lot of money and then given away to its original owners you would expect the SEC to raise their eyebrows. However Focus Media has insisted in multiple documents that the recipients of this largesse are not related parties.

Four possible interpretations of the accounts

I am going to give you four possible interpretations of the accounts. I am not doing due diligence on this company, I have no access to inside information and can only make educated guesses as to the probability that any of these interpretations is correct. However as the company has been audited you would have to guess that (A) below is most likely.

Interpretation A - the accounts are straight

The first interpretation is that the accounts are absolutely straight and the company is absolutely straight. As these accounts are audited by Deloitte this is the situation you would normally expect.

In that case this is a stupendously profitable company where the profits over the years (and then another half a billion dollars) have been squandered by existing management on a bunch of really bad acquisitions.

If Interpretation A is correct the Private Equity buyers will get a fantastic deal with this transaction. After all - they will be buying a stupendously profitable company and the PE buyers - if they have any skill at all - will take over the capital allocation. The really bad acquisitions will stop.

Interpretation B - the company is being looted through deliberately awful acquisitions

The second interpretation is that this is a hugely profitable company that has over time over half a billion dollars in operating profits - but the management of the company are venal and have stolen this money by buying assets from friends (or related parties) at inflated prices.

When I see a set of accounts that look like this looting is the first thing I think of. After all - audited accounts for 2011 show that this is a really great company - however over time that greatness has accrued primarily to the people they have purchased assets from.

I guess that is why the SEC wanted - in their correspondence - to assure themselves that the parties that sold assets to Focus Media were not related parties. I have no particular reason to believe or disbelieve the assurances of Focus Media on that issue other than that I would expect Deloitte to have examined the matter.

If Interpretation B is the case then the PE buyers should still probably close the deal (they will be buying a stupendously profitable business). But PE buyers will have their work cut out. The current management (who it appears have done a fantastic job of running the business) are - in this interpretation - crooks - who need to be watched abnormally closely. You probably want to leave then running the business - but you certainly don't want them near the money.

[If this interpretation is correct the management probably won't stick around anyway - they have already got rich on looting...]

Interpretation C - that the disclosed losses are a cover for political corruption


A third interpretation is that the money was deliberately lost by the company through all those acquisitions and the losses funded bribes.

In this interpretation the company did not really “lose” the money. Its payments was bribes that if honestly accounted the company might have expensed.

If this interpretation is correct then the private equity buyers will walk. Firstly, if properly accounted the bribes would be expensed - and that would bring the business down to a normal level of profitability. This is - in interpretation C - not a massively profitable business.

Moreover Carlyle in particular cannot run this business – because after the change in ownership the recipients of the bribes won't stay bought – and Carlyle - as owners - can't buy them again because it would expose Carlyle to the Foreign Corrupt Practices Act. The FCPA is probably the most commonly criminally enforced white-collar crime provision in the US. A reputable American firm does not want to go there.


Interpretation D - the company is faking its profits and balancing its books through fake losses on acquisitions and fake losses on discontinued business

Interpretation D suggests that no looting is involved. Instead the company has consistently faked its revenue up by reporting as revenue money it never received and never will receive.

The problem with reporting as revenue money never received is that over time the books don't balance. Auditors go looking for the cash and it is not there because it was never received.

In that case the company has to pull some stunts to make the books balance. The easiest way is to take their fake cash and make a fake acquisition. That makes the fake cash disappear into fake goodwill.

Over time you have to write off that fake goodwill otherwise the auditor will go looking for the attached asset. To make sure the auditor can't look for the fake asset you either close it or give it away. Then it is gone for good - but you get a write-off as you do this. In this interpretation those write-offs have tallied over a billion dollars.

In this case the PE buyers don't want to buy the company. They are buying a business that is break-even not profitable. The acquisitions made (and losses taken) are simply the way in which the books balance.

Muddy Waters and interpretation D

Muddy Waters published quite a deal of material that was consistent with but did not prove interpretation D. Some of this is well known. For instance this company has a habit of buying assets for large sums, running them for a while and giving them back to the original vendor. That is certainly consistent with Interpretation D.

Moreover some evidence exists that the revenue numbers are on the high side. For instance the seemingly high level of revenue per screen (as per this post) is consistent with Interpretation D. Previous disclosures where they appear to have overstated the number of screens are also consistent with Interpretation D.

To the Private Equity buyers: in doing due-diligence on this company you need to think about Interpretation D and how you test for it. Because if D is right then - dear Private Equity buyers - you are buying a turkey.

What is the stock worth in interpretation D?

Interpretation D is the interpretation with the sharpest negative implications for the stock. What is says is that the entire numbers of this company are garbage - and the real profitability - evidenced over the last five years - is likely negative or somewhere near it.

If interpretation D is correct the stock should settle at a very low value. (I have some ideas on how to work out the value but they are quite speculative... diligent readers might make some estimates themselves. My estimates come in under $2 at a maximum...)

For consideration.








John