← All companies ← YDDL Manual YIBO → ← WMK Food & Drug Retailing
YI, 111 Inc.
A retailer, earning thin margins on high volume, where inventory turns, unit economics and scale decide the outcome.
The business
What it sells, where the money comes from, the kind of company it is.
The business in brief
read the 10-K →What this business is and what moves its needle, from its own SEC filings.
- Situation
- Unprofitable. No sustained operating profit across the record; an earnings multiple has nothing to rest on. What the record does show is revenue, the gross-margin trajectory, and the burn against the cash on hand.
- What moves the needle
- Operating margin has run around −5.8% through the cycle on a 5.7% gross margin, the operating line deeply negative — so the lever is the path to a margin at all: revenue growth against the cost curve and the cash runway, not the level of a margin that isn't there yet. On its own account, the filing leans hardest on concentrated dependence, set against the numbers in what the filing emphasizes, below.
Every line is arithmetic on the company's filings, shown in full in the sections below.
The record
Ten years of arithmetic, read across the cycle.
The record, 2016–2025
realized figures from each filing · older years to the left| 2016’16 | 2017’17 | 2018’18 | 2019’19 | 2020’20 | 2021’21 | 2022’22 | 2023’23 | 2024’24 | 2025’25 | TTMTTMDec 2025 | |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Income statement | |||||||||||
| CN¥874M | CN¥959M | CN¥1.8B | CN¥4.0B | CN¥8.2B | CN¥12.4B | CN¥13.5B | CN¥14.9B | CN¥14.4B | CN¥12.6B | CN¥12.6B | RevenueRevenue |
| — | — | — | 4% | 4% | 5% | 6% | 6% | 6% | 6% | 6% | Gross marginGross mgn |
| (CN¥364M) | (CN¥254M) | (CN¥400M) | (CN¥494M) | (CN¥473M) | (CN¥642M) | (CN¥371M) | (CN¥350M) | CN¥2M | (CN¥2M) | (CN¥2M) | Operating incomeOp. inc. |
| −41.7% | −26.5% | −22.4% | −12.5% | −5.8% | −5.2% | −2.7% | −2.3% | 0.0% | −0.0% | −0.0% | Operating marginOp. mgn |
| (CN¥363M) | (CN¥249M) | (CN¥382M) | (CN¥502M) | (CN¥467M) | (CN¥621M) | (CN¥376M) | (CN¥353M) | (CN¥21M) | (CN¥23M) | (CN¥23M) | Net incomeNet inc. |
| Cash flow & returns | |||||||||||
| (CN¥389M) | (CN¥204M) | (CN¥343M) | (CN¥512M) | (CN¥117M) | (CN¥689M) | (CN¥23M) | (CN¥447M) | CN¥263M | CN¥119M | CN¥119M | Operating cash flowOp. cash |
| CN¥12M | CN¥15M | CN¥11M | CN¥12M | CN¥14M | CN¥27M | CN¥41M | CN¥22M | CN¥17M | CN¥12M | CN¥12M | DepreciationDeprec. |
| (CN¥37M) | CN¥30M | CN¥28M | (CN¥22M) | CN¥336M | (CN¥95M) | CN¥312M | (CN¥116M) | CN¥267M | CN¥130M | CN¥130M | Working capital & otherWC & other |
| CN¥5M | CN¥7M | CN¥14M | CN¥20M | CN¥26M | CN¥63M | CN¥32M | CN¥10M | CN¥15M | CN¥4M | CN¥4M | CapexCapex |
| 0.6% | 0.7% | 0.8% | 0.5% | 0.3% | 0.5% | 0.2% | 0.1% | 0.1% | 0.0% | 0.0% | Capex / revenueCapex/rev |
| (CN¥394M) | (CN¥211M) | (CN¥354M) | (CN¥524M) | (CN¥131M) | (CN¥716M) | (CN¥55M) | (CN¥457M) | CN¥248M | CN¥115M | CN¥115M | Owner earningsOwner earn. |
| −45.1% | −22.0% | −19.8% | −13.3% | −1.6% | −5.8% | −0.4% | −3.1% | 1.7% | 0.9% | 0.9% | Owner earnings marginOE mgn |
| (CN¥394M) | (CN¥211M) | (CN¥357M) | (CN¥532M) | (CN¥142M) | (CN¥751M) | (CN¥55M) | (CN¥457M) | CN¥248M | CN¥115M | CN¥115M | Free cash flowFCF |
| −45.1% | −22.0% | −20.0% | −13.5% | −1.7% | −6.0% | −0.4% | −3.1% | 1.7% | 0.9% | 0.9% | Free cash flow marginFCF mgn |
| — | — | — | CN¥23M | CN¥12M | CN¥6M | — | — | — | — | — | BuybacksBuybacks |
| — | — | -31% | -65% | -131% | — | — | — | — | — | — | Return on equityROE |
| — | — | −31% | −65% | −131% | — | — | — | — | — | — | Retained to equityRetained/eq |
| Balance sheet | |||||||||||
| — | CN¥168M | CN¥854M | CN¥581M | CN¥1.2B | CN¥661M | CN¥674M | CN¥604M | CN¥462M | CN¥511M | CN¥511M | Cash & investmentsCash+inv |
| CN¥28M | CN¥20M | CN¥29M | CN¥65M | CN¥163M | CN¥404M | CN¥489M | CN¥537M | CN¥413M | CN¥260M | CN¥260M | ReceivablesReceiv. |
| — | CN¥144M | CN¥211M | CN¥486M | CN¥767M | CN¥1.1B | CN¥1.5B | CN¥1.4B | CN¥1.4B | CN¥998M | CN¥998M | InventoryInvent. |
| — | CN¥128M | CN¥212M | CN¥444M | CN¥1.1B | CN¥1.3B | CN¥1.8B | CN¥1.6B | CN¥1.7B | CN¥1.3B | CN¥1.3B | Accounts payablePayables |
| CN¥28M | CN¥36M | CN¥27M | CN¥107M | (CN¥144M) | CN¥178M | CN¥223M | CN¥368M | CN¥79M | (CN¥24M) | (CN¥24M) | Operating working capitalOper. WC |
| — | CN¥730M | CN¥1.5B | CN¥1.5B | CN¥2.9B | CN¥2.8B | CN¥3.2B | CN¥2.9B | CN¥2.6B | CN¥2.1B | CN¥2.1B | Current assetsCur. assets |
| — | CN¥201M | CN¥315M | CN¥773M | CN¥1.6B | CN¥2.1B | CN¥2.7B | CN¥2.7B | CN¥2.3B | CN¥2.0B | CN¥2.0B | Current liabilitiesCur. liab. |
| — | 3.6× | 4.8× | 1.9× | 1.8× | 1.3× | 1.2× | 1.1× | 1.1× | 1.1× | 1.1× | Current ratioCurr. ratio |
| — | CN¥763M | CN¥1.5B | CN¥1.6B | CN¥3.0B | CN¥3.1B | CN¥3.5B | CN¥3.1B | CN¥2.8B | CN¥2.2B | CN¥2.2B | Total assetsAssets |
| — | (CN¥168M) | (CN¥854M) | (CN¥581M) | (CN¥1.2B) | (CN¥661M) | (CN¥674M) | (CN¥604M) | (CN¥462M) | (CN¥511M) | (CN¥511M) | Net debt / (cash)Net debt |
| -485.1× | -4618.6× | — | -136.3× | -53.7× | -117.0× | -27.6× | -17.4× | 0.1× | -0.1× | -0.1× | Interest coverageInt. cov. |
| — | (CN¥946M) | CN¥1.2B | CN¥777M | CN¥357M | (CN¥173M) | (CN¥415M) | (CN¥583M) | (CN¥643M) | (CN¥702M) | (CN¥702M) | Shareholders’ equityEquity |
| Per share | |||||||||||
| 72.0M | 72.0M | 99.5M | 164M | 165M | 166M | 167M | 169M | 172M | 174M | 174M | Shares out (diluted)Shares |
| CN¥12.14 | CN¥13.33 | CN¥17.96 | CN¥24.15 | CN¥49.78 | CN¥74.91 | CN¥81.12 | CN¥88.66 | CN¥83.81 | CN¥72.15 | CN¥72.15 | Revenue / shareRev/sh |
| CN¥-5.05 | CN¥-3.46 | CN¥-3.84 | CN¥-3.07 | CN¥-2.83 | CN¥-3.74 | CN¥-2.26 | CN¥-2.10 | CN¥-0.12 | CN¥-0.13 | CN¥-0.13 | EPS (diluted)EPS |
| CN¥-5.47 | CN¥-2.93 | CN¥-3.56 | CN¥-3.20 | CN¥-0.79 | CN¥-4.32 | CN¥-0.33 | CN¥-2.71 | CN¥1.44 | CN¥0.66 | CN¥0.66 | Owner earnings / shareOE/sh |
| CN¥-5.47 | CN¥-2.93 | CN¥-3.59 | CN¥-3.25 | CN¥-0.86 | CN¥-4.53 | CN¥-0.33 | CN¥-2.71 | CN¥1.44 | CN¥0.66 | CN¥0.66 | Free cash flow / shareFCF/sh |
| CN¥0.07 | CN¥0.09 | CN¥0.15 | CN¥0.12 | CN¥0.15 | CN¥0.38 | CN¥0.19 | CN¥0.06 | CN¥0.09 | CN¥0.03 | CN¥0.03 | Cap. spending / shareCapex/sh |
| — | CN¥-13.14 | CN¥12.31 | CN¥4.75 | CN¥2.17 | CN¥-1.04 | CN¥-2.49 | CN¥-3.46 | CN¥-3.74 | CN¥-4.04 | CN¥-4.04 | Book value / shareBVPS |
The diluted share count moved ×1.65 into 2019 — shares issued, not a split the totals corroborate — and the per-share figures carry the counts as filed.
| 9-yr | 5-yr | |
|---|---|---|
| Revenue / share | +21.9%/yr | +7.7%/yr |
| Capital spending / share | −11.2%/yr | −30.2%/yr |
The record, charted
FY2016–2025Each measure over its full record; the current point and the worst year marked.
Owner earnings vs. net income
Owner earningsNet incomeThe accountant's number, and the cash an owner can take; the gap is the tell.
Net income is the accountant's number; owner earnings is the cash an owner could take out. The walk between them, off the cash-flow statement, and whether the gap is widening or holding.
In fiscal 2025 the business turned a CN¥23M loss into CN¥115M of owner earnings: more cash than the profit line showed, after the non-cash charges and the capital it put back in.
| FY2025 | FY2024 | FY2023 | FY2022 | FY2021 | |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Reported net income | (CN¥23M) | (CN¥21M) | (CN¥353M) | (CN¥376M) | (CN¥621M) |
| Depreciation & amortizationnon-cash charge added back | +CN¥12M | +CN¥17M | +CN¥22M | +CN¥41M | +CN¥27M |
| Working capital & othertiming of cash in and out, other non-cash items | +CN¥130M | +CN¥267M | −CN¥116M | +CN¥312M | −CN¥95M |
| Cash from operations | CN¥119M | CN¥263M | (CN¥447M) | (CN¥23M) | (CN¥689M) |
| Maintenance capital expenditurethe spending needed just to hold position and volume | −CN¥4M | −CN¥15M | −CN¥10M | −CN¥32M | −CN¥27M |
| Owner earnings | CN¥115M | CN¥248M | (CN¥457M) | (CN¥55M) | (CN¥716M) |
| Growth capital expenditurediscretionary; spent to get bigger, not to stand still | — | — | — | — | −CN¥35M |
| Free cash flow | CN¥115M | CN¥248M | (CN¥457M) | (CN¥55M) | (CN¥751M) |
| Owner-earnings marginowner earnings ÷ revenue | 1% | 2% | -3% | 0% | -6% |
Owner earnings is the cash an owner could pull out without starving the business: operating cash less the capital it must spend to hold its position .
Maintenance capex is estimated as depreciation where a growing business invests above it; free cash flow is the figure the scorecard's free-cash margin reads.
Quality & stewardship
Returns, the balance sheet, capital allocation, and pay.
Owner’s Scorecard
Will it survive?
- Can it pay its interest? -0.1×Does not cover its interestOperating income (CN¥2M) ÷ interest expense CN¥20M
What this means
A full year of operating profit didn't cover the interest bill. This is the zombie zone: the business depends on refinancing, asset sales, or forbearance to service its debt.
- How heavy is the debt, net of cash? +CN¥511MNet cash, debt-freeCash CN¥511M − debt CN¥0
What this means
Cash and short-term investments exceed every dollar of debt by CN¥511M, on net the company owes nothing, and can act from strength when others can't. Net debt is the leverage figure that matters: the cash is already set against the debt. Strategic or illiquid investments aren't counted here.
- Negative, funded by othersDSO 8 + DIO 31 − DPO 40 days
What this means
Days cash is tied up between paying suppliers and collecting from customers. A negative cycle is a quiet moat: suppliers and customers fund the operation (Buffett's “float”), the company grows on other people's money.
Is it a good business?
- Not enough dataIndustry peers: median 28%
What this means
The filing data didn't include the inputs for this check.
- Positive this year, negative across the cyclelatest CN¥115M = operating cash CN¥119M − maintenance capex CN¥4M (positive this year), after an earlier loss stretch (10-yr median -6%)Industry peers: median 5%
What this means
What an owner could take out without starving the business: operating cash less the maintenance capital it must spend to hold its position — Buffett's owner earnings. That's 1% of revenue this year, a -6% median across 10 years.
- Are earnings backed by cash? CN¥119MLoss, but cash-generativeNet income (CN¥23M) · cash from operations CN¥119M
What this means
The company reported a net loss, so a conversion ratio isn't meaningful. What matters then is whether operations still threw off cash, here, they did.
How is the cash used?
- Not enough data
What this means
The filing data didn't include the inputs for this check.
- Investing or harvesting? 0.38×HarvestingCapex CN¥4M ÷ depreciation CN¥12M
What this means
Descriptive, not a grade. Above ~1× means investing faster than assets wear out (growth, or, sustained for years, today's earnings carrying less depreciation than tomorrow's will). Below means spending less than it's wearing out (efficiency, or a melting asset base). The ratio won't tell you which; the filings will.
Graham’s defensive tests · 0 of 3 met
Graham’s numerical criteria for the defensive investor (The Intelligent Investor, ch. 14), run on the filings. A floor of safety, not a buy signal; many fine modern businesses fail his strictest liquidity rules by design.
- Adequate size —Revenue ≥ $2B (a dollar floor) · CN¥12.6B
What this means
Big enough to weather a storm. Graham's floor is a dollar figure — about $2B of revenue as a conservative modern stand-in. This company reports in its home currency and we carry no exchange rate, so we show the figure and leave the size bar for you to apply rather than convert it with a number we don't have.
- Strong liquidity MissCurrent ratio ≥ 2× · 1.09×
What this means
Current assets at least twice current liabilities, near-term bills covered without touching the business. Strict by design: many cash-rich modern firms run leaner and miss it, holding their cushion in longer-dated securities.
- Earnings stability MissA profit every year (10-yr record) · 10 loss years
What this means
Graham wanted earnings in each of the past ten years, the stability a defensive owner leans on.
- Dividend record MissUninterrupted dividends · none paid
What this means
An unbroken dividend was Graham's mark of durability. He wanted twenty years; the filings show about ten, and a single suspension breaks the streak. Non-payers, many fine modern compounders, fall outside his defensive net by design.
- Earnings growth —Earnings +33% over the record · —
What this means
Earnings were negative early in the record, a growth rate isn't meaningful.
- Moderate price —P/E ≤ 15 and P/E × P/B ≤ 22.5 · decided by the price
What this means
Graham's valuation gate, the wall he kept between a sound business and a sound investment. Three-year average earnings are CN¥-0.76/share (latest year CN¥-0.13), the averaged base the calculator's gate runs on, and book value is CN¥-4.04/share. Enter a price in “What the price implies” just below for the P/E, P/B, and whether it clears. But this is the rule Buffett outgrew: there's no hard P/E law, and a wonderful business can deserve a far richer multiple if the thesis holds, treat it as the bargain-hunter's floor, not a verdict on the price.
Durability & moat, 2016–2025
Whether the record’s returns held, and what the capital reinvested earned.
- Profitable years 0 of 10
What this means
Lost money in 10 year(s), look at what happened there before trusting the average.
- Operating margin −30% → −1% (3-yr avg ends)
What this means
Through the cycle the operating margin widened — about −30% early to −1% lately, median −6% — pricing power intact or improving.
- Worst year 2016 · −41.7% op. margin
What this means
Operations went underwater in 2016, understand why before trusting the good years.
Does AI threaten the moat?
Moderate contestabilityAI is likely to reshape costs and some products here without clearly contesting or sparing the core moat; how the company itself frames it is the tell.
The question is whether a moat the record shows as durable outlasts a technology that lowers the cost of part of what the firm sells. The durability is read in the record above, the filing's own framing of AI beside it; the industry label decides nothing on its own.
Read from the filing's own risk factors, paired with the industry's structure under its SIC code; the durability is read above, the price below.
All figures as filed; the source filing is linked above.
Current Position
as of fiscal year-end, Dec 31, 2025Can the business pay what it owes this year, off the freshest balance sheet: the quality of the assets, the debt actually coming due, and what a low ratio means here.
- Cash & short-term investmentsCN¥511M
- ReceivablesCN¥260M
- InventoryCN¥998M
- Other current assetsCN¥356M
- Accounts payableCN¥1.3B
- Other current liabilitiesCN¥671M
From the company's latest filing.
Peers, Food & Drug Retailing
The same industry, side by side on owner economics. Each figure is a through-cycle median, so a peak or trough year can’t distort it; the group median at the foot is the line to read each against.
| Company | Revenue | Gross margin | Op. margin | ROIC | Owner earn. margin |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| CDWCDW Corp. | $22.4B | 17% | 6.6% | 17% | 5% |
| DKSDick's Sporting Goods | $17.2B | 32% | 7.1% | 28% | 6% |
| CHWYChewy Inc. | $12.6B | 27% | -0.8% | — | 2% |
| YI111 Inc. | CN¥12.6B | 6% | -5.5% | — | -4% |
| WWayfair | $12.5B | 28% | -5.4% | — | 1% |
| ULTAUlta Beauty Inc. | $12.4B | 38% | 13.4% | 48% | 10% |
| NSITInsight Enterprises | $8.2B | 15% | 3.4% | 13% | 2% |
| BBWIBath & Body Works | $7.3B | 44% | 17.3% | 56% | 11% |
| Group median | — | 27% | 5.0% | — | 4% |
The price
What a price has to assume.
What the price implies
reverse-DCFEnter the US price, in dollars: the NYSE/Nasdaq quote you hold. Per the filing's own cover, “American depositary shares, each of which represents twenty Class”; 111 Inc. reports in CNY, so every figure in this tool is stated per ADS and translated at CNY 1 = $0.147 (2026-07-17, reference rate) so your dollar quote reconciles exactly. The record tables elsewhere on this page remain as filed, in CNY.
Type today's close and see the owner-earnings growth you'd have to believe to justify it, beside what 111 Inc. has delivered.
—
9.0% = the 4.55% 10-year Treasury (Jul 15, 2026) + 4.45 points of equity premium. The rate you require is yours to set.
Enter a price above to run it.
A dated snapshot of the price you typed, the assumptions you set, and what the page showed for them. A snapshot is never edited after it is saved. Your notebook is yours alone — the commitment states what is stored and what we will never do.
Graham capped the multiple at 15×; Buffett and Munger let that rule go: a wonderful business can deserve 50× if the thesis holds. The gate marks the bargain-hunter's floor.
Prefilled with the 10-year Treasury (4.55%, as of Jul 15, 2026). Edit it for today’s exact figure, or a AAA corporate yield.
Graham measured a stock against the bond you could own instead, the heart of his margin of safety. Enter a price above to weigh the owner-earnings yield against this bond.
Owner earnings $17M on 9M shares outstanding (a weighted average, the only count this filer tags); net cash $75M. The base is the latest year by default; Normalize values it on the through-cycle median owner-earnings margin (to avoid paying on a peak year). Net of stock comp treats option pay as the expense it is. The dials set the multiple a growth belief justifies; the price, and every dollar on this page, is yours.
Manual order: ← YDDL its page in the Manual YIBO →
Industry order: ← WMK the Food & Drug Retailing chapter