Vmoto versus Niu, page-69

Thanks for pointing that one out, Kleuskenn, it is an interesting read.

It looks like the Motley Fool analysts in the United States are a bit sharper than their Australian counterparts, who have been ignoring Vmoto for years.

There was one line in the article that particularly caught my eye:

...Niu is also worth just $2 billion, meaning the stock could easily double or triple from here, and potentially run much higher, while Tesla stock faces stiffer growth headwinds...

Just $2 billion?. I wonder what that same analyst would make of Vmoto, with its market capitalisation of $150 million (and that in Australian dollars: the figure in US dollars converts to an underwhelming $110 million).

That said, apart from the vastly disparate market capitalisations, there is another significant difference between Vmoto and Niu.

The other day I noticed that the blurb for VMT on the Commsec website describes the company as ...a leading global scooter manufacturer and distribution group...

There is reason to suspect that this description is largely inaccurate, at least at this point in time.

Although the company doesn't provide any detail on the breakdown of their sales numbers, there is good reason to believe that the letters 'T' and 'C' would feature quite prominently in the company sales reports.

The image below, taken from the Google Trends website, indicates the trend of searches relating to the Super Soco TC, TC Max, TS, TSX and Cux models over the past five years:

The numbers for each of the five models showing in that box to the right is relative to the peak number of searches ('100') for any of the terms listed in the input boxes at the top of the screen (according to this, the peak number of searches was for the TC back in late July/early August).

But the figures for last week show '68' for the TC, '31' for the TC Max and '8' for both the Cux and TSX models. The TS model seems to be weakest link: it doesn't seem to have prompted a single search on Google last week.

While I wouldn't read too much into the Google Trends data- the figures seem to have a strong bias to developed countries- I don't think there is any doubt that the Super Soco TC has been the leading light for Vmoto.

The fact that Vmoto Soco seems to be the leader in the electric motorcycle space is especially promising, as there is reason to suspect that this EV segment is the least developed of all the electric vehicle classes.

On Friday, an article from a regional French news site featured an interview with the local local Super Soco distributor in the lead up to a regional electric motorcycle fair set to be held in the locality this week.

I found the commentary in the introductory paragraphs interesting, as it adds weight to the suspicion that the electric motorcycle market is basically at an embryonic stage:

...On the occasion of the "electric mobility day", a trade fair which takes place this Thursday at the Dijon Prenois motor circuit, we met Mathieu Legras, who runs a Dijon dealership which only offers electric motorcycles and scooters. While cars, scooters and electric bikes are becoming more and more numerous in the streets around the Dijon area, electric motorcycles are still quite discreet. Hindered by budgetary constraints, the lack of offerings and the limited network of charging stations, very few professionals or individuals have opted for this mobility option...
I think what is true for the Dijon region of France would be true for pretty much everywhere else.

With the TS models apparently having proven to be a hit, it would seem that Super Soco is currently positioned as the market leader in the electric vehicle niche with the most potential for growth.

Having said that, I don't think the future success of this company rides solely on the popularity of one of its motorcycle models.

In particular, there is much to like about the CPX scooter model, and indeed there are signs that this model is gaining traction, even if it still early days.

Searches for the CPX model only start showing up on Google Trends in November last year, and the searches have been limited to six countries, all within Europe.

But as can be seen on the chart above, the TS started to attract interest on Google as early as the first half of 2018, and the searches for this term originate in more than 30 countries across the globe.

This possibly suggest is that the CPX is yet to be rolled out in a large number of countries.

If the CPX scooter emulates the success of the TS, or even gets close, I suspect that alone could boost the annual unit sales of this company by about 10,000. That should give Niu a run for their money.