Sporting Goods:Nike results,more positive signs,especially for footwear ODMs

Basketball: Jordan strong: management saw accelerating momentum forthe basketball category, with the Jordan brand growing 13% YoY in FY17.

    Nike also expects another strong year for the Jordan. This is positive toFeng Tay, given we estimate it is the major source of the Jordans.

    Lebron James to catch up: Kyrie 3 and Paul George 1 were among theother top performing basketball shoes models. We believe the delay andElite model cancelation with Lebron James 14 (that hurt Feng Tay YTD) willnot repeat in the upcoming Lebron James 15 cycle.

    Nike Sportswear delivered double-digit growth in 4Q17: we estimate FengTay is involved in the VaporMax R&D and supply, albeit with small volumeallocation. We see Yue Yuen as one of the major sources of AirMax.

    New shoe platforms: we believe Feng Tay is involved in the developmentof new shoe platforms including ZoomX, Nike React, HyperAdapt 2, andshould act as one of the major suppliers for these new platforms.

    Competition from FLEX (FLEX.OQ, USD16.34): Nike commented that FLEXhas cumulatively produced c. 1mn pairs of footwear (DBe started in 2015),representing c. 0.2% of Nike’s global volume. We remain less concernedabout FLEX taking significant market share given the strong efficiencygains by ODMs and continued bottleneck with full automation.

    Expanding use of Flyknit: Nike is widening the adoption of Express Lane,which we believe relies heavily on Flyknit. Nike also commented it wouldexpand Flyknit into apparel (sports bra). We believe this represents thenext generation of Flyknit.