D. B. Corp Limited (DBCORP) Earnings Call Transcript & Summary

Ladies and gentlemen, good day, and welcome to the D.B. Corp Limited Q1 FY '22 Earnings Conference Call. [Operator Instructions] I now hand the conference over to Ms. Hina Agarwal. Thank you, and over to you, Ms. Hina.

Thank you, and good evening to everyone. We welcome you to the D.B. Corp Limited Q1 FY '22 Post Earnings Conference Call. We have with us today the senior management team of D.B. Corp Limited. Mr. Pawan Agrawal, Deputing Managing Director; Mr. Girish Agarwaal, Non-Executive Director; Mr. P.G. Mishra, Group CFO; Mr. Mushtaq Ali, Vice President, Finance and Account; Mr. Lalit Jain, CGM, Finance and Account; and Mr. Prasoon Kumar Pandey, Head, Investor and Media elution, who will represent the D.B. Corp Limited on the call. We will be sharing the key operating and financial highlights for the quarter ended 30th June 2021, followed by question-and-answer session. Before we begin, we would like to state that some of the statements made in today's discussion may be forward-looking in nature and may involve risks and uncertainties. Documents relating to the company's financial performance have already been e-mailed to you and are available on the website of the stock exchanges and company's Investor website. We trust you have been able to go through the same. Now I invite Mr. Pawan Agarwal to share his outlook on D.B. Corp's performance for the quarter. Thank you, and over to you, sir.

Thank you, Hina, and good evening, everyone. Hope all of you and your families are healthy and safe. We will begin the call by highlighting the key financial performance for the quarter ended June 30, 2021, followed by operational updates during the quarter. Economic activities accelerated in the third and fourth quarters of financial year 2021, but the second wave of COVID-19 offered a new set of challenges with the localized lockdowns. While the financial impact on the operation was not as severe as the previous year, it certainly slowed the return to normalcy. Throughout this period, the Dainik Bhaskar Group demonstrated extraordinary resilience. Company's well-calibrated editorial and circulation strategies contributed in mitigating disruption. Additionally, our cost optimization efforts contributed in limiting the impact of disruption during these tough times. Consolidated advertising revenues stood at INR 1,713 million in Quarter 1 FY 2022, while circulation revenues stood at INR 1,106 million, and the total revenues came at INR 3,080 million. Consolidated EBITDA stood at INR 51 million, aided by efficient cost control measures and despite large investment in the digital business for future growth. We have reported a net loss of INR 223 million in Q1 FY 2022 after interest and depreciation and tax. On the digital front, we continue to invest in our digital businesses, which has expanded substantially at a steady, sustainable pace over the last year. And we continue to provide the world -- the best in world-class news experience on our digital apps with no advertisements at all even during COVID. We are pleased to report that we have largely achieved our goal of becoming the #1 Hindi and Gujarati news app, and we intend to increase our lead even further in the months ahead. According to the recent Comscore report, attributable to high-quality content development and a highly personalized product experience, our unwavering commitment to deliver the best customer experience has been critical in maintaining and improving user retention in our key markets as well as aided us achieve a long-term growth and monetization goals. Dainik Bhaskar Group Radio business continues to maintain a leadership position in all significant markets. Radio advertising revenue for the quarter stood at INR 156 million with an EBITDA loss of INR 2.5 million in Q1 FY 2022. I would now request Mr. Girish Agarwal to update us on the operational front.

Thank you, Pawan. Good evening, everybody, and I hope that everybody continues to safe and healthy. Let me first of all touch upon the recent CBDT officials visit to our offices at across various locations to inspect our book of accounts. They arrived on the early morning 5:25 a.m. on 22nd July and stayed in our premises for 7 days. They are analyzing our books, and we have -- and we will continue to lend our full support to those officials. And following the conclusion of the investigation, we shall update the exchanges in the market once we get received all the information from the department in writing to us, and then we'll be able to communicate back to all of you and the stock exchanges. Coming to business, resurgence of COVID-19 posed a new set of challenges for the Industry. To address the surge, all state governments implemented lockdown and restricted mobility and activity. This suddenly has slowed the economic recovery prompting market sentiments to become cautious. With the number of cases decreasing in states, doing a calibrated removal of restrictions and faster vaccinations, the economy has begun on the path of recovery. The pent-up demand and the lockdown imposed in the second wave, coupled with the government stimulus package, is likely to generate a stronger economic rebound. Additionally, with this festival season approaching the second half 2021, we'll see renaissance in the print advertising with brands across the industry investing heavily in the most credible medium to reach out to the audience. On the editorial front, we continue to take a strong journalistic approach, very strong, I would say, while keeping the readers at the forefront of all our efforts. During the pandemic, our editorial teams remain true to its core ideologizes of courageous and honest journalism, providing our readers with unbiased, courageous and truthful reporting. Here, I would like to mention that all our journalists, those who reported COVID on the ground, they actually risked their life for our leaders to ensure that the truth should come out, the actual fact on the ground should be known to the world. And I'm really thankful to all of them. Our innate commitment towards responsible journalism has not only strengthened our readers connect, but has also helped us getting the recognition of India's most admired, respected read newspaper, while also making a footprint on the global landscape. You would be aware that most of the international newspaper mentioned the reports of Dainik Bhaskar and Divya Bhaskar in their editorial pages. We will continue to implement a reader-centric strategy, and we will expand knowledge by delving into various issues that give critical information to our readers. We believe that our reader-centric editorial strategy will continue to bolster our standing in the market in which we operate, resulting in increased advertising spending also. On the circulation front, while Dainik Bhaskar's well-calibrated circulation strategy continued and contributed to the spectacular recovery of the circulation following the first wave. And I'm happy to say that the second wave was not that tragic in terms of circulation. We are almost there. However, we further need to focus to see how we can achieve the pre-COVID level faster. On the advertising front, the economy is witnessing a broad-based rebound, as the country recovered from the second wave of COVID-19. We are experiencing a faster recovery in non-metro towns and cities, especially in our markets. As a result, the demand for print advertising space is witnessing an up search. Advertisers are increasingly turning to the print media, which is certainly the most credible medium. Our recent exclusive advertising deal with various clients in automobile sector and FMCG sectors are the testaments of our strong presence and outstanding journalism practices also to attract the readers and in turn the advertisers. With phase unlocking the company registered a month-on-month improvement in advertising revenue from April to June and to July. We are seeing an uptick in the advertising spend across major categories as a sense of optimism and economy increases with the forthcoming festival season, we anticipate advertising spend to further improve. Our cost optimization drive continues to aid in improving the margins, I would say, in the current sector, in saving the margins actually. Despite the COVID second wave, which led disruption in advertising and all that, we were still able to -- the print business made an EBITDA of -- in the quarter 1 of INR 381 million, which is a margin of 13% EBITDA. While if I compare it to the Q1 of '21, it was certainly a much worse scenario that time. And I hope that going forward, this will further improve and show a hockey stick kind of recovery. I would like to reiterate that despite the difficult economic environment, we continue to outperform the print sector in terms of advertising and circulation going to our reader-centric approach, our journalism excellence, product innovation and well thought-out implemented circulation strategy. Going forward, we intend to further solidify our market position by providing compelling values to our leaders as well as advertisers. This is all from our side. Me, my colleagues and I will now be happy to respond to your questions. Thank you.

[Operator Instructions] The first question is from the line of Himanshu Upadhyay from PGIM.

The -- what we see is the readership has come back or it is very nearly back or it has not decreased in Q1 versus Q4, okay? But from here on, what would be the path for advertisement growth, okay? And what is happening on ground in terms of intensity of competition, pricing on advertisement side, if you can elaborate? And what are the currently number of pages, what you are doing versus, let's say, in the Q1 of FY '20? You can give some idea on what is happening.

So as you rightly mentioned that the circulation has not disturbed much because of the second wave of COVID. But I would say it actually derailed some process of growth to further go back to the pre-COVID level. What we are planning to achieve in the Q2 of this year to go back to the level earlier, I think that will now get pushed up by another maybe 2 quarters. So let's see -- let's hope that should come back faster. From the advertising revenue perspective, in the month of April, again, as you know, Jan, Feb, March was good enough. In April, suddenly mid of April this whole COVID thing started coming again. So the May got again washed out, came down to almost 25% of May '19 level. I'm actually going to compare the entire year for '19/'20 rather than '20/'21 because '20/'21 was very uncertain year. So there's no point feeling happy that I was higher in the last year of May. So I would actually compare from May '19. So we went down to as low as 27% of May '19, but June came up to almost 40%, 42%. But I'm happy to say, in July month, we were able to achieve almost 75% of July '19. So that's a good, good indication, and things are moving in the right direction. And happy to say that it's not only 1 or 2 categories, those who are coming back, most of the categories are coming back, whether it's automobile or education or FMCG or real estate, especially education, which actually shifted because education was planned to be in the month of April, May, June because of COVID, now is happening in the month of July, August because the results are coming late and examinations are happening late and all that. So yes, let's hope that this whole talk of Delta variant happening and the third wave and all that should not happen. So that our festival season, which is happening from month of September, October, November, stays intact.

See what we hear on from various people, okay, the demand generally seems to be very strong for across the companies, okay. This is what we keep on hearing. And even if we take 2019, April, May, June, our FY '20 was on a slow moving downside trajectory only in the economy, okay? The slowdown was slowly steadily taking place. So what -- do you think we can get back to that level? And how much time should it take? Because...

As I mentioned to you that July, we are at 75% of July '19. And August, as we already done 13 days of August, looks very promising. So I hope if this continues like this, we are already back in the '19 -- 2019, '20 levels right now, keeping the fingers crossed.

So my only point was because 2019 also was a difficult year or a down year only. It was economically slowdown year, okay. That was the thing.

No, no, I...

My next question was on radio business, okay? And what is happening on the radio business because that remains leaking boat for us. And are we seeing improvement on that business also and your thoughts on that business?

Yes. So in radio, the Q1, of course, we did just at about 60% of last year. But we are again seeing a very sharp recovery in the month of July and August in radio as well. And when we are comparing with our peers in the national markets, I'm happy to share with you that Q1, we grew about 94% compared to last year Q1, but the other -- all the other peers were roughly about 43%, 44%. So we had a robust Q1 compared to the overall market. And we are seeing good recovery in July.

One last question from my side. Are the rates down only, let's say, versus March, April, May, June of 2019, advertisement yields, I would say for both radio and newspaper? Or they are back to the normal level?

They're almost back to normal, I would say.

[Operator Instructions] The next question is from the line of Shivam Saxena from ICICI bank.

My question is, have you taken any cover price hike because raw material prices have increased substantially, paper products? So any plan to take price hikes or have you taken?

If you compare our Q1 of this year and Q1 of last year, we have taken an 8.5% price hike in the last 1 year's time. And if you compare Q4 and Q1, we have taken a 2% price hike in terms of average cover price.

Okay. So is it sufficient to cover the raw material cost because the paper prices have increased sharply? If we see in the last 6 months, the raw material prices have increased sharply. So are you able to maintain that margins based on these price hikes? Or are you taking -- going to take further price hikes in the future?

So as of now, certainly, this is not covering the price hike which has happened in the newsprint sector. But there's a limit, which we can pass it on to our readers. So as of now, this is what we have done. We have certainly some head margin, had room to increase the cover price furthermore, but we are yet to take a call on that.

And any government advertisement coming on your because of elections are due? So any -- that is coming on your print media or not?

Elections, as of now, the Punjab government election, UP government elections are going to happen in the Quarter 3 or 4. So We'll see at that point. As of now, no, we are not getting any major government advertising. In fact, our government advertising, a few states, is already on hold.

Sorry, what you said last?

Our government advertising from few states is on hold.

Any specific reason for that?

No, we've been talking to those departments. They've stopped releasing the ads to us. So we are talking to them. We don't know the reason.

[Operator Instructions] The next question is from the line of Anish J from Banyan Capital.

Sir, in terms of circulation, we have done quite well. We have been able to maintain our revenues. But sir if we look -- compare it to the pre-COVID, I believe we are still, I think, a 10%, 15% short? So the question is, sir, how important is it for the circulation revenues to go back to 100%, for our advertising revenues also to go back to the pre-COVID levels? How are they two correlated to each other from the advertisers' perspective?

In certain markets, they are, for example, where we can have more domination. So I'm not actually comparing the number in my mind that if I achieve this, I'll achieve this. I'm using that number that if today, I have increased my market share in terms of circulation in Jaipur, in Ahmedabad, in Patna, in Indore and Bhopal and all these markets something if I gain more circulation. If I gain more circulation, then certainly, my lead will increase much more over my competition. And also what we have noticed in the last 1 year's time, thanks to the amazing, fantastic editorial work done by our team, the time spent of a reader in our newspaper has gone up. That's also very useful for the advertiser.

So my second question is in terms of the recovery of our revenues, and also thinking from the -- our customer segment perspective. So there are two things which has happened, one is some of the customers that were important for us in the past, say, before FY '21, there has been decline in their spending in the last, say, 1.5 years. And also, there has been a shift of -- I mean if you see digital revenues have grown well during the COVID times, right? So what is your reading about coming back to our pre-COVID levels in terms of the shift of the different sectors, which will get us back over there? And how much would we have permanently lost to the digital? So if you could help to understand how we will get back to the pre-COVID levels, especially in terms of the sectors which will get us back?

So in certain sectors, it's difficult to quantify that how much we have lost to some other vehicle or medium. But what we can certainly see that the sectors, which will help us to come back, are certainly automobile, education, real estate. These are the few sectors, which will certainly help us to come back because these sectors are bouncing back very strongly, not even bouncing back, they're growing actually. So once these sector grows, we'll be able to grow along with them.

So just one follow-up question, if I can, like you mentioned, we have gained a lot of permanence as of print media after COVID because of more trust on our -- what we publish. So if you could help to understand whether this automobile, education, real estate, which you mentioned. So you are expecting higher spends from these advertisers going forward, let's say, versus 1.5 years back? Are you seeing that more number of sectors will open up. So there'll be more opening up of the segments or the sector, which will drive us back? So is it more deepening with the existing sector or more broadening that is going to get us back?

I would say both. So for example, a particular automobile client, if you were advertising with me in my markets, now because of my much more credible, my much more involvement with the readers, his spend with me will go. His market share with me will increase, which we are noticing also. There are a couple of clients those who are now doing very strong market share with us. That's one. Second thing, there could be a couple of customers in particular category, those who are not earlier focusing with us, now they are looking at us also.

The next question is from the line of Rahul from RN Associates.

I have two questions. Can you please tell us about more about exclusive deal about Skoda Kushaq, which you have mentioned in your investor presentation? And second about newsprint prices for Q1 and going forward?

So these two deals, which we have mentioned in our press release, we have actually done a few more deals like this. Basically, these are the advertisers, those who came on board during the COVID times also and signed a deal with us that showed that they were looking at the market from a market leader perspective, and it shows us in those markets. So that's about the confidence of our brand, which helps us attract more brands. Same thing happened in other few categories also. And we are thankful to them. And we are very happy that they got the desired result. And that's the reason they are back, and there are many more those who are with us now.

So any specific amount of deal, which you have cracked so that for the for 2 years or 3 years, that plan will be with you?

No, No. All these deals are quarterly deals. Because in this environment, everybody is looking at a month and quarter. So no advertiser will sign a 2-year deal with anybody because of the uncertainty around. But this builds up the whole confidence.

And how about newsprint prices for this quarter? And going forward, what is your outlook?

Let me give you the numbers. The newsprint rate, which last year was around INR 35,000, INR 36,000 per tonne in the quarter 1 of last year. This year, our rate is almost INR 41,000. So there's been an almost 15% increase in the newsprint rates for us. Surprisingly, that the Indian newsprint rate has increased much sharper than the imported, simple reason why? Because we have the stock of the Indian with us, we had the forward agreement with India -- imported with us. While the Indian guys have increased their prices by almost 35%, they impact on us. While imported, though the impact is there but since we had the forward buying in the stock, the impact is not that sharp. What we are analyzing the market trends right now, there has been an increase in newsprint price all across the imported newsprint price. People are talking about almost USD 700 per tonne going forward. Even the Indian newspaper society has also indicated that kind of prices going forward. And the reasons are very clear, there's a huge shortage of the raw material. Even the raw material prices have gone up, like the newspaper, the waste, which you used to sell in a domestic household earlier, which was at INR 13, INR 14 a kg, today that has gone up to almost INR 27 to INR 29 a kg. All these reasons and also the high marine freight due to the limited container and vessel space availability. There's increased demand from China, both packaging and other products of the news -- of the paper. So all these things are actually impacting the overall increase in the newsprint pricing. So what we believe the current price, what we have in the next quarter, what we can see in the quarter 2, there will be at least 2%, 3% increase in the prices for in the quarter 2 also.

So it will be somewhere around INR 43,000, INR 44,000 we are expecting?

No. INR 43,000, INR 44,000 becomes almost 8%, 10%. it will be 2% to 3% for the next quarter. And let's hope that from the quarter 3, the price starts cooling down because the newsprint -- the raw material prices should come down. The availability of the vessels will increase. So that all should give some benefit going forward.

The next question is from the line of Yogesh Kirve from B&K Securities.

So I understand the emerging businesses. So it's now compared mainly of our digital businesses only?

Emerging is largely digital, yes.

Right. So there, I see a cost base. So if I just take a difference between revenue and EBITDA is like INR 37 crores per quarter. So how should we look at this cost related to digital business? I mean, I would presume that there will be some amount of nonlinearity and this may not increase significantly or at least it will not increase in line with revenue. So is that understanding right?

Yes. So this cost of digital, as you know, we have got some huge benefit in last 1 and 1.5 years' time, whereas per the Comscore only, we have shown a growth of almost 7.5x in terms of our app. Our entire focus is on app because going forward, looking at the mobility around. And if you want to monetize it in some way, it has to be through app. It can't be through the web. So we are very, very happy with the response what we are getting on our app. And that's what the investment what we are doing. And as you noticed that -- and I would encourage you to download our app, Dainik Bhaskar.app. And you'll see the amazing experience of users there because we don't have any advertising there. So I think because of that, this cost base, what we have taken, I think this cost base will not go much higher, but this cost will continue for a couple of quarters more.

Right. Sir, secondly, on the revenue side. So there's two aspects to this, regarding the monetization on our app, and we take note of what you have said in the earlier calls regarding the focus right now on the readership -- on increasing the user experience. But on the other side, so we have been reading about the deals with Google and Facebook. So is there any update regarding that?

So we are in talk with all these players to see how we can do some win-win situation. But it has to be a win-win. So we are waiting for that win-win to happen. It may take some more time.

So any sort of broad guidance or any indication of when we could see losses to -- the revenue scaling up and losses declining in the digital business?

To be very honest, as we indicated to you in earlier quarters also that I think this is a time for us to do some steady investment in digital in terms of gaining more numbers, more number of download, more number of people coming on to our app on a daily basis and all that. So that's our focus. Revenue model is very simple since we are not taking any advertising. So maybe a couple of players, as we've mentioned with you, could sign some deal with us for data -- for the new sharing and all that. And it could be the app monetizing by the readers. So that would certainly take some more time.

Okay. A bit of a follow-up regarding the previous question regarding the newsprint prices. So given the extent of volatility, so if I got it right, I mean, spot prices have gone up by as much as 35% in domestic market. So we are quite comfortable that increase for us will not be more than 2%, 3% in the coming quarters? Or there could be a risk based on the volatility in the market?

For the Quarter 2, we know the number. So we have mentioned to you. Quarter 3, frankly speaking, we have -- don't have much of clarity because the international freight and the vessel availability, then the local raddi value, which is a waste paper, which goes in recycling for the newsprint, all is pretty volatile right now. So I would suggest, let's not take assumption for the Q3 right now.

The next question is from the line of Yash from JP Associates.

My first question is with regards to the PO. Now you helped us with the ad revenue that we had, the recovery or that we had as compared to May '19. Could you also please help us with the PO recovery percentage that we have against the pre-COVID level? Now this is my first question. And the second would be regarding the pagination. Have you increased the pagination? Or are we seeing that there is going to be an increase during the festival season? Obviously, if you can help us with the percentage as well? And the third is with regards to the other operating revenue that we are seeing in the financials, there seems to be some sort of an increase in that. Could you also please help us with it?

So let me go with the first question of PO, currently at around 42.5 lakh copies, which is a decline of almost 6% over the Q4 because in Q4, we were on the path to recovery, we were almost at 45 lakhs, 46 lakhs copies. But because of the COVID, again, certain -- the trains stopped, buses stopped. So our markets were shut, offices were shut, around 6% loss of the copies came in. But we are hopeful that this should recover immediately in this quarter. And then from next quarter, we need to get to go back to our earlier numbers.

That would be around?

Peak number in FY '20 was almost 55 lakh copies. So yes, that was the peak numbers. We need to see we still have a long way to go, if we have to achieve the peak number. But if I look at the pre-COVID number, we were at around almost 47 lakh, 48 lakh copies. So we need to achieve that also.

With regards to the pagination, have we...

So the pagination is a straightaway function of the number of advertising comes in your paper. So for example, in the current quarter, our pagination is around 16 pages, okay? If I compare that with the pagination of FY '21, the Q4 and Q3 is certainly down because the last quarter because of COVID, the advertising was less and all that. But going forward, this month of July, August, September and next quarter, the pagination will be back to a much higher number. Like last week, our Muzaffarpur edition did their anniversary issue of 120 pages. Jodhpur did a issue of almost 100 pages. Today is a Bhopal anniversary so they did -- between today and tomorrow, they are doing almost 50, 60 pages average every day. So pagination is all issue of the advertising.

What about the other operating revenues that you are seeing?

So that is the interest on the FDR actually. So other operational income is the interest on FDR from the Q-on-Q because the FDR amount has gone up so because of that.

That would be other income, right? I'm talking about the revenue from operations, apart from circulation and ad revenue?

That must be -- I'll have to get back to detail on that. That must be the sale of certain waste paper and other things and all that and some job work of printing what they do.

Okay. And the salaries, we are seeing an uptake. Now I remember you had mentioned in the last quarterly results, during the last call, that it should be around about the level that we're seeing now. So are we seeing this on account of the salaries getting reinstated or?

Where is the uptake. I think help me understand the number. Let me read the number for you. The personnel costs for the quarter 1 of this year is at INR 881 million. While if I look at the number of Q4, it was INR 1,061 million. So from Q4 to Q1, there is a decline of 16%, 17% actually. You're saying...

Uptake was in Q4, and you had mentioned that that was on account of the salaries that are being paid?

Q4 -- if you're comparing with the Q4 of '19/'20?

Yes.

But that was uptake of just 2%, 1.7% to be precise.

And now we are seeing a downtrend on account of?

Yes, because the number of people have gone down, we have automized a lot of processes.

[Operator Instructions] The next question is from the line of Himanshu Upadhyay from PGIM.

My 1-- 2 questions I had. One was, what is happening in the local markets. I mean, we are seeing a lot of people running into losses, the large players in the newspaper. The smaller would be into further losses on this? And with 15 months of lockdown and bad economics, do you think your positioning in terms of -- with the advertisers has improved? And what is the scope to increase the circulation copy in the current environment? Can you elaborate on these two things?

Sure. So as you rightly mentioned that in most of the markets, the larger publications are the ones who are able to survive and manage and thrive in last few years, I would say, not only last 1.5 year. I'm talking about last -- if you look at the last 5 years, 7 years trajectory, these smaller obligations are actually anyway getting out of the business. Coming to gaining the market share, yes, it's certainly helping us that we've been able to gain the market share from the circulation as well as the advertising perspective also in most of the markets, which will certainly help us going forward also.

In a market, let's say, Rajasthan type of market, what would be the market share of the top 3 Hindi newspaper in advertisement versus others? So is there also pie, which is for the smaller players, sufficient advertisement revenue? Or do you think it is just marginal so it won't impact us even if they go out? Just to understand at Rajasthan or Gujarat.

If look at the overall circulation data, and if I look at the Indian readership survey data, in Rajasthan, largely, there are only 2 players, Dainik Bhaskar and Rajasthan Patrika. Almost 90% of the market is distributed among these 2 publications. And market share from the circulation perspective, if you look at overall Rajasthan, me and Patrika from the overall circulation were almost at par. From the readership perspective, if you look at the urban market, we were ahead of Patrika. The moment you look at Jaipur, we are at a lead of almost 50% over our competition. And in further segment, the lead keeps increasing. Similarly, on the advertising front, this reflects accordingly.

So even if small players go away, the increase in the advertisement may not be that much, okay, because, let's say, Rajasthan and Gujarat would be also similar to the top 3 with 90% market share?

Totally. Generally speaking, in most of the markets, there are only two players, except a few markets there could be third player also worthwhile.

Okay. And in one of the comments, you stated that the government agencies are not giving the advertisement or -- is it -- it seems that it was -- they are not giving advertisement to you?

Yes, they are not releasing the advertising to our newspaper.

So they are giving to other newspapers but not giving to us? This is what you are trying to say.

Yes.

Is it particularly 1 or 2 states? Or is it some districts or what is happening?

No, in few states.

The next question is from the line of Jayesh Jain from Edelweiss.

I actually wanted to understand how the pricing is looking like and how the discounting has been, not just on a quarterly basis, but compared to 2018, where we have the peak EBITDA margin. So the pricing has trended upwards, it has gone down. Can you share some colors on that?

The advertising price or the cover price?

Advertising pricing.

Let me see. Frankly speaking, if I...

I know paper-wise, but just give me a broad understanding of how the pricing has trended in the last 3 years.

Yes. So I would say the pricing in the -- from the year '18/'19 and '19/'20 were almost stable. But in the year, '20/'21 prices went down because of the COVID. Within '20/'21 also, I would say prices went down drastically in the Q1 and Q2, did the correction in Q3 and Q4 was okay. In this year, which is '21/'22, the Q1 prices again went down because of the second wave of COVID. Right now from July, things are looking slightly better. To be very honest, it will be too premature for me to comment that the pricings are back to pre-COVID number because we also don't know how the market is going to be for the advertisers. So let's see some steady opening up of the market, some response, and then certainly, we can talk about the price.

But currently, how much behind it will be, let's say, 2019 or pre-COVID level?

I would say...

On a broader level.

15%, 20%.

And to have a better understanding, if some advertiser has to do a digital marketing and looking for the same coverage, let's say, 10-kilometer radius, it's just a assumption, how different would be on digital pricing than, let's say, a newspaper prices?

See, frankly speaking, you can't really compare the two because what are you buying in digital and what are you buying in print are two different things. So for example, in digital, are you looking at the banner, you are looking at what -- so the two really can't be compared exactly. So there's no parameter right now with us to say, this compared to this, this is a difference.

[Operator Instructions] The next question is from the line of Shivam Saxena from ICICI Bank.

Just wanted to know how your digital medium is competing with the physical copies? Any competition within that?

I would say rather than big competition, it's actually complementing. So what happened in the morning, you read my paper. And during the day, you are able to keep yourself updated through my app. Especially, for example, if you are either in a Jaipur city, and you are traveling for 2 days' time. Earlier for those 2 days, you were totally missing my paper. Now because of my app, you can download my e-paper and see the newspaper. I think that's an advantage. So I would not take it as a competition, I would take it as a complementally reworking together.

And any charging you are taking for downloading the paper?

No, not now. That's the whole objective going forward.

Okay, okay. And any plans of launching advertisement on your digital media?

See, right now, no plans. But let's see how it unfolds going forward.

How many apps downloads have been till date? If you might give the number?

Yes. We took this liberty from all of you a couple of quarters back that please allow us not to give out the numbers considering the competition around. And you were all kind enough to say that, yes, for a couple of quarters, you can do that. So please give us the time again.

Sure, sure. Okay.

But I would say that as per the Comscore report, we have shown a growth of 7.5x in last 1.5 years.

Ladies and gentlemen, due to time constraints that was the last question for today. I now hand the conference over to the management for closing comments.

Thank you very much for your participation and time on this earnings call. I hope that we have responded to your queries adequately today. We'll be happy to be of assistance through our Investor Relations department, headed by Mr. Prasoon Panday, for any further inquiries. Take care, everyone, and stay safe. Thank you.

Thank you.

Thank you. On behalf of D.B. Corp Limited, that concludes this conference call. Thank you for joining us, and you may now disconnect your lines.