저자: 미상 · 외국인
요약 보기
GoPro를 둘러싼 Markiplier의 900만 달러 투자 논란을 분석한 영상. 발행 13.6년 가까운 GoPro의 매출 31%↓, 손실 확대, 순부채·운전자본 적자(약 2억 달러대), 창업주 2천만 달러 구제 대출, 대출약정 위반 및 기업 존속 의문을 근거로 기업 가치가 취약하다고 주장. 인수합병 발표 직전 5% 이상 지분 보고 지연, 협찬 고지 문제 등 공시·윤리 쟁점 제기. 내부자거래 가능성은 언급하나 증거 부족으로 확률 낮다고 봄.
다듬은 글
This is madness. What if I told you that if you invested $1,000 in a GoPro at its peak, it would be worth $17.64 now ? Yes, that's a loss of over 97 percent. But what if I told you that if you had invested $9 million just a few months ago, you could have turned it into $15 million because the company announced a takeover, and you happened to avoid that crash and just fell in love with the stock right before you perfectly invested $9 million in a collapsing company to turn it into $15 million?
This sounds a bit suspicious, but that's exactly what Marc Robert just did. Now the question is: was what he did wrong? Did he know something we didn't? Let's analyze this from a financial analyst's perspective. Because—and I'll show you the video clips in a moment—Mark tells us that he just loved the shares.
It seems to be borrowed from the days of Roaring Kitty and GameStop. But these promotions are very different from GameStop. GameStop was being sold at a price below their net cash. That is, literally cash minus expenses—they had more money left after deducting expenses than the market value of the company on the stock exchange.
Mainly due to massive short selling of GameStop stock. So, is GoPro the second GameStop? Well, let's look at the financial statements and see if there is any value in them and if this company is really worth buying, because maybe the market is simply undervaluing it. After all, that was exactly Roaring Kitty's argument.
Hey, you know, I like stocks. The numbers look good. They are sold at an inverted valuation . Why, why shouldn't I buy this? It seems like I'm making a good investment. Can you say the same about GoPro? The best thing to do is simply look at the financial statements. So, if we look at GoPro's latest financials, we find the following.
First, their income fell by about 31% year-on-year. Their expenses only decreased by 25%, which means their expenses actually increased relative to their income, right? So, their profits fell even more. You would like that if income falls by 31%, then at least expenses would also fall by 31%, but no.
The company is simply operating at very low efficiency . And so their profits actually fell by 42%, and losses increased 2.7 times compared to last year . So, the company is clearly in decline. Not only was the company in decline, but its founder was forced to provide a $20 million bailout loan to keep the company afloat.
This is not good at all . In fact, we have a little note about this. Here is this note. On July 8, the founder gave GoPro a $20 million loan because they were completely out of money. The CEO also received insider options that gave him more leverage in the event of a takeover of the company, which is what happened, as we learned on September 1.
So now the CEO will get his $ 20 million loan back plus about $ 9 million under those options. To be fair, it was disclosed, so everyone knew about this loan. But what about Mark? Mark says, "It looked like a cheap company." And that he liked the company's valuation. And when we look at their balance sheet, this is where I'm a little confused.
Because you see, the company has about $97 million in cash and proceeds. They also have about $86 million in inventory, but that assumes they can be sold at the value listed here. Of course? So if we scroll down a little bit , we'll find out about their bills, also known as current liabilities, that are due within the next 12 months.
They have bills for $353 million. And that means, if you keep track, that they are "in the red" by about $200 million. In fact, more than $200 million. They are in debt for about $270 million. Closer to 200, assuming they can sell all their stock. Well, let's say they were able to sell all the stock, okay.
You still end up in the red by $200 million. And since the company's losses just increased 2.7 times, and you're losing $51 million per quarter, according to the latest quarterly report, and you're in the red by $200 million, your cash situation is literally getting worse every day. This is a " walking zombie" who can't afford to pay the bills.
Just to show it from a different angle. GoPro was losing $560,000 a day. This means that Mark's $9 million investment would have disappeared in equivalent terms in 16 days of such losses. Because their income was constantly fluctuating. They lost about 81 million in the first quarter. They lost 9 million during the Christmas season.
They lost 51 million in the report they just released, or in the quarter they just reported. And they keep burning money, right? They don't have a very good balance. This is a company you look at and think is about to go bankrupt. This looks bad. There's nothing to like here, unless you're hoping for some kind of redemption in the near future.
To look at it from a different angle. Let's look at their balance a little differently, okay? So, let's compare everything together. If I generously add the cash they have, let's assume everyone actually pays them the money GoPro owes them. This is an account receivable. And they will sell all their stock.
In that case, they would have a total of $174 million in assets. But they have to pay the bills they owe, other bills that are already on the table, like upcoming bills , debts, other debts, right? They have to pay all of this within the next 12 months. This amounts to 405 million. If you subtract those two numbers, you can see that the gap is over $200 million , $230 million in the red.
Now, on paper, if you add goodwill, they are still in the red. And if you calculate the tangible book value, they are also in the red. So, whatever you say, whether to use long-term assets , which are included in the tangible book value, or include their reputation, which is actually worthless on paper.
No matter how you evaluate this company, they are in deep trouble. Book value is negative, you understand? This is not something you should invest $9 million in unless you somehow think this office is about to take off. In my opinion, I want to be clear, okay? This is just my opinion as a financial analyst looking from the side, it looks strange.
In addition, the company has already revealed a few things. In March, they already announced that they had violated the terms of their loan agreements. In other words, they effectively defaulted on the debts they already had . It was bankruptcy that was already coming their way. In May, they also said they had significant doubts about their ability to hold out or survive over the next 12 months.
This is called " business continuity". You often hear this about new startups, but very rarely about a company that has been around and public for 11-12 years, unless it's about to go bankrupt, right? They pay the bank $250,000 a week. They're trying to, uh, or the amount is actually growing to a million dollars as the maturity dates of these loans approach.
And they openly stated that they had to refinance or complete everything by January 2027, otherwise they would have problems and would have to pay a $5 million penalty in the event of bankruptcy. So, the banks were already telling everyone, "You guys figure this out yourselves, because you're a sinking ship, and we're actually going to foreclose on your assets." Like, we will demand full repayment of the loan from you.
This is not good. Of course, in fairness , on May 11th the company said it was open to a sale or merger, but that's a pretty standard pre- bankruptcy statement, as if you were sounding the alarm. It's like being in the middle of the ocean and shooting an orange flare into the sky. Like: "Please. Please.
" Someone, buy us." So you can see that in their latest report, right here. In May, they began the process of evaluating a potential sale or strategic alternatives. But who would want to buy a company that is going bankrupt? That's the question. The fact that they are publicly asking: " Hey, please buy us." You know, someone else has to take the risk for you and cover those losses.
So it's strange to expect someone to buy a ship that's on fire. And it's strange to invest, according to rumors, up to 30% of your capital, Mark. Uh, some people say they don't know how much capital he has. They only know that he invested $9 million right before announcing this acquisition. Here are a few more points about time, okay?
So, on July 13, Mark's share in the company exceeded 5 %. It took him 6-7 weeks to submit the report, which was supposed to be submitted within five business days or seven calendar days. Then, on August 27, he releases a sponsored video about GoPro and fails to mention that he owns shares in the company.
It only notes that the video is sponsored. On August 30, a Bloomberg article appears about his stock holdings. And 2 days later, they announce a merger at a price of a dollar and 14 cents per share, although, if you look at the chart, the share price has collapsed. But if we zoom in on the last hour, you'll see the Bloomberg news about Mark's stake come out, and the stock jumps from 70 cents, about Mark's purchase price, and goes up every day all the way to $1.70.
So if you bought them for 70 cents and they're now worth 1.70, you're in the black, in this case, more than 2.4 times, which is pretty impressive. So, is Mark selling his shares? It seems not. We do n't know for sure. If it only gets $1.14 at the announced acquisition price, it will still be in profit by about 60- plus percent.
So it's still pretty impressive. But the timing is a bit strange. Let's clearly understand how this graph works, and we understand that Mark is not a financier, maybe he just didn't know. But, to make it a little more clear, okay ? As of July 13, you owned more than 5% of the shares, which is literally stated in your own report, okay ?
You are required to file a report within five business days of crossing the 5% threshold, which was due on July 20. You only filed the report on August 20, which was exactly about 12 days before the merger announcement. Sure, the SEC only gives a little " hands-on" for late filings, but that's a bit strange.
So, essentially, you turned $9 million in investment with an average acquisition price of about 69 cents into a deal price of $1.14; A company that was losing $9 million every 16 days got a $ 9 million bet from you , and now you have a stake of $15 million at the deal price. But now the shares are trading even above that deal price.
So you have even more. This is very interesting. So how does all this fit together? How do we put all this together? Because there's another thing that raises suspicion: in the videos that Mark released, he updated the description, indicating that he is now the owner of the shares. Look, look at this.
I used the Wayback Machine, just pasted the YouTube link, and got the snapshot for August 27th. And here is this description . Pre- order Mission 1 ILS , use code Markiplier. OK. So you and I know this is an affiliate link. But note that nowhere, at least in the description, does it say that this is sponsored content .
There is no note here that this is an advertisement. There is no note here that this is a company he owns or has invested in. And it is unclear whether it was necessary to mention it. He could just be making an investment. He is not obligated to tell everyone about his portfolio. Well, but, you know, I don't care.
Ignore this. I mean, I think most people know that affiliate links are sponsorships and advertising. But Kim Kardashian got a lot of credit for that. I mean, she got it in a lot of ways. But, um, she, you know, she posted an affiliate link on her Instagram. And then she was fined, quite significantly, for not disclosing the fact of paid sponsorship .
To be fair, in Mark's video, which is 13:37 long by the way, it's actually pretty cool. Eh, but anyway, he eventually updated the description, and in the video, to be fair , he says it's sponsored by GoPro, but he doesn't mention anything about selling or owning stock . He has since updated the description.
It's written in red here, this is updated, well, part of this is updated. "I'm the largest shareholder of GoPro, and I was talking about Mission One." "So this little section right here, these words," "I'm the largest shareholder of GoPro." "He's the largest individual shareholder among non-insiders, because he owns like 8.5 % or whatever it is right now.
" That was added. Uh, right in, yeah, I've been blabbering about GoPro for months, right here. ""I'm the largest shareholder in GoPro, and I've been talking about GoPro for months. "Uh, or new, oh, he even updated it to 'new Mission One cameras for months.'" Interesting. It seems like he's trying to change things up a bit.
Oh, yeah, I bought this because I was promoting Mission One because I'm really excited about interchangeable lenses, and you know, it looks like a refrigerator behind me, but it's actually a dry storage for lenses because I'm so into lenses, and now GoPro has interchangeable lenses. I like that. That's why I'm going to buy the stock, because I'm really bullish on this stock.
That's a good defense and a good argument. Simply put, putting $9 million on your belief that this company that's losing that much money has no chance of surviving the next 12 months. Putting $9 million in stock for, you know, just 60 days before the merger announcement seems a little fishy. They might as well have gone bankrupt in January.
You just hit the nail on the head. in those 60 days right before the merger. Okay. Maybe? Let's see what he says on the Philip DeFranco show, because that's where he gives his version of events, so to speak. And, um, let's see if that lines up with what was said. contact Markiplier. And among other things that we talked about, he explained why he thought the company was undervalued.
I decided that the market cap was undervalued just because of the name. They're literally So, that's it. And that's fine. It may not be the best financial analysis, but I mean, if you look at a company with a $105 million market cap that's literally "in the red," they have a cash deficit of $230 million.
Some would argue that even $105 million is too much. That it should be zero. Because they owe a lot more. " Linux in the world of cameras," because people often call any GoPro action camera, even if it's a different brand. That's fair. It's... you know, nobody says they're a financial expert. It's like, "Hey, GoPro is such a big brand." "I think it should be worth more." "This is a really awkward time for this, if that's true." So I just assumed that just because of that they had value, but I knew they were up to something.
I think I knew they were up to something . That's always an interesting phrase, especially when you have what looks like a branded affiliate link that, you know, uses the code "Markiplier." It kind of implies that you're talking to someone inside the company, which doesn't necessarily mean you've been given inside information.
Is it possible that there were some hints or winks? Like, "Dude, yeah, the stock is going to go up." "Just don't tell anyone." Yeah, and if it was over the phone, no one would ever know. If If there were documented emails or text messages advising people to buy these stocks, that would be inside information.
Inside information is very bad. Inside information is a form of fraud. So it's not illegal to trade based on what's publicly known. The company did announce that it was for sale. There was a very clear disclosure that the founder was taking out a bailout loan. It was very clear that they were going bankrupt.
All of this information was public. But insiders inside GoPro would have known that they were in talks to acquire the company. So people knew when it was going to happen, the price, and who was buying it. So maybe that "I knew they were up to something " was enough of a hint to be confident and invest $9 million at that point.
Does that amount to insider trading? It depends on who gave the hint, I guess. But, uh , let's say Yeah, it always seems like the way the rich get richer, huh? It was probably ignorant of me to say that I got to where I am by accident. But, uh, I had no intention of getting to this point. Even Philip's face here says, "Bro ." Where do I have to file papers and say, " I own such and such a part of this company." I've never done that for any company before.
It was just, you know, I really believed in it and thought, "This looks like a good investment." And then I learned what 13 is like as a good investment. Based on what financial metric? Based on what part of the balance sheet, the cash flow statement or the income statement ? The part where they're losing $51 billion a quarter?
The part where their profits are getting worse, like their expenses aren't falling as fast as their revenues are falling? Was that part? It was the fact that they don't have the money to survive from this point on. by January? That was the financial part. What part? G didn't say, "Oh my God, I have to report to the SEC.
Oh my God." And when you invested, that's a classic move, by the way. That's actually the exact scenario that Roaring Kitty used. And to be fair, Roaring Kitty did have financials that he could point to. He could actually point to and say, "Look, this is why this is fundamentally worthless." And he was right.
We do n't have that here. We have terrible financials. Now, Roaring Kitty, remember when he was intentionally late for his broadcast and he came in with what? A neck brace or a broken arm or whatever ? He was in a cast or a sling or something. And he was acting like a clown or something. That's the point.
You don't want to come across as, "Oh, I'm so official, you know, I should know better." Because, you know, then it could have been interpreted as, “Well, you should have known better.” And the intention. And it was something like, “Oh, I didn’t know. Now I’m going to have to file with the SEC.” That’s crazy.
That’s weird. “ I had no idea.” I guess you were registering as a passive investor? Mhm. That part doesn’t matter. D or G, who cares? He didn’t think about the company for Form 13D and had inside information. Roaring Kitty seems to have at least some faith in the company. He’s used GoPro cameras for some of his YouTube videos.
He filmed behind the scenes of his debut film, Iron Lung, on one of them, right? He’s clearly a fan of the company. I mean, I’m not trying to be unrealistically optimistic, like they could… Look, they released their financial statements, I’ve certainly looked at them, but I’ve definitely looked at them .
What? That face doesn’t look like you “exactly” "But let's say he did. Please tell me what part of their financials seemed attractive enough to you to invest $9 right before the merger for a 68% return. You know, sometimes you have to take a big risk, and I think you just... Yeah, sometimes you just have to go all in, you know, this stock has been down for 5 years.
Let's just decide to take a big risk right now. This is an example of how GoPro is doing it with the Mission One. That's the big risk. You see how they're rebranding everything now, like, it was actually the Mission One, man. It was the catalyst. Maybe it was. So it's like going all out for the camera, and it's really great.
And then, while many were excited or entertained by Markiplier getting into this, there was also news that his investment angered some people. And part of that reaction has to do with because a few days ago, before his investment report came out and the stock price jumped, Markiplier released a video promoting a new GoPro camera.
Yes, it's called the ILS Mission One. It's tiny. It's relatively cheap, about 700 bucks without any extra equipment. And GoPro is promoting it as a movie camera, implying that you can use it for, uh, blah blah blah . You can watch the rest of it on Phil's channel. But, uh, I mean, we're going to show the part where he admits that this is a sponsored video.
So what's useful about this is that you see him say, "Hey, you know, I told you this was sponsored." Now, why is this important? Because if we keep watching Philip, we're eventually going to get to the point where he says, "Oh , well, you know, there's just no convenient place to disclose that I own stock." I, uh , you know, I noticed that this sponsored, and I thought that would be enough, like I was playing it safe." Then, but there are no comrades in taste and color.
And so I asked Mark what his reaction to that was. What is your reaction? Actually, I don't know. Where is the line that is being crossed? I think for me, when I look at it, I really believe in it and I'm willing to back my words with money. This opens up accessibility. I want more people to make movies.
I want more people to create videos for YouTube. I want more people to create content that looks real. So I'm going to invest $9 million and now present it as if I did it for society. I don't even know if GoPro knew I was an investor because it's just filed with the SEC. Apparently, when you buy shares, the company doesn't know who is buying them until they disclose it publicly through one of those forms.
Because you are not buying from the company, you are buying from other shareholders. He also added that he used all available tools to let people know that there was a financial element to it for him. But I talked about sponsorship from the very beginning because I wanted to imply that I had some financial gain from it.
I don't know the exact rules on how I should disclose this. And I want to make this very clear. I asked. It's a little confusing because he's actually saying, "Oh, I said it was sponsored because I own the stock." But wait, you had an affiliate code. You had the Markiplier code. So you would say " sponsored" because you had the code if it were truly a sponsorship.
And if you were trying to imply that somehow the "sponsored" label should now also mean, "Oh, by the way, I also benefit if the stock goes up in price." I mean, it's a pretty creative argument, but it seems a bit far-fetched . So, to sum up, what are the chances that the SEC will come after GoPro and Mark with any kind of subpoenas or investigation?
I would probably give about 60% that they will investigate this. This is quite public and looks suspicious. What are the chances that something will come of this and there will be documentary evidence , for example, "a smoking bullet", here is the text where we told you that this would take off, because we were up to something and hinted at it to you.
What are the chances that this will actually surface? Probably closer to 3%. So, to sum it all up , it's unlikely anything will happen. This company is expected to be acquired by a photonics company that also operates in the defense sector. Which is quite interesting. The company is conducting a reverse merger.
So the shares are expected to remain public. I think that's one of the reasons why the stock is trading higher at $ 14, because you're essentially pouring this private company into GoPro. And then they will report on consolidated financials, and hopefully there will be further growth. And it doesn't look like Mark has sold anything yet .
And even if he tried, I imagine the stock would just fall because it's not very liquid . So for now, he only has paper profits and a history to protec. With you i.
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