MakeMyTrip Limited (NASDAQ:MMYT) Q3 2023 Earnings Call Transcript

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Mohit Kabra: Two reasons, Guarav, if I could call it out. You will look at it overall, in terms of the market recovery. So if you look at even domestic air, the overall market recovery is at about 90%, whereas our recovery, it’s kind of close to about 100% plus. So therefore, while we are growing ahead of the market, but the market recovery itself is at an industry level is lagging, the pre-pandemic segmented volumes. So that’s one reason, and secondly, if you look at it in terms of the overall, air ticketing kind of a pace, like Rajesh was calling out international hasn’t really kind of bounced back as strongly. So that’s the other reason for the lag in the overall recovery for the air ticketing business as a whole.

Gaurav Rateria: Second question, how should one look at the lower customer inducement charge as percentage of the gross booking? Is it that the competition or the competitive activity has subsided in the market? And hence, there is no need for that high customer inducement charge? Is it more tactical, like shift between branding versus customer inducement charge? How should one think about like overall ad and promotion spend, you have always been saying 5% to 6%. But it’s kind of come out the lower end. So how should one think about it on a sustainable basis?

Mohit Kabra: No, I think on a sustained basis, like we’ve been saying possibly the range would be more like 5% to 6%, and a couple of things going in over there. One clearly is the extent of competitive activity that we’re seeing in the market. And as you have seen that kind of makes a difference. Secondly and more importantly, I think it is also about building a certain amount of base of volumes, in each of the relevant or important segments, particularly including the hotels and kind of packages segment or in overall accommodation segment. There, if you see over the last, almost like six, seven years, we have gradually built — robustly built volumes over there. And as is kind of inherent in the e-commerce models or the online models, as you build volume, customer acquisition costs start kind of panning out much better.

So, I think there is about getting to a threshold pace. And therefore, you see why there has consistently been a decline in the marketing sales promotional expenses. Over the last, I would say, six, seven years, that reduction has kind of become sharper over the last few years as we’ve kind of crossed that threshold. Pretty much almost just kind of pre-COVID is what I would put it around. So, that’s another factor apart from the fact that there is much lower competitive intensity particularly in the hotel segment.

Gaurav Rateria: Last question, the cash balance if I compare versus last quarter, I think has come down from 466 to 449. Is there something missing? You have generated lots of like large EBIT during the quarter should have cash flow and should have gone up. So, how should one read the decline in cash?

Mohit Kabra: You are right. This being a seasonally high quarter, you know, usually we do see deployment and working capital during peak seasonality. And then you also see releases happening, as you kind of move into the lower seasonality quarter of quarters. So it’s kind of largely linked to seasonality per se and nothing else over there.

Vipul Garg: Thanks, Gaurav. Just to remind the participants, anyone who wishes to ask a question can click on the raise hand option. Next question is from the line of Aditya Suresh from Macquarie. Aditya, you can please unmute your line and ask the question now.

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