Blackboxstocks Inc (BLBX) 2022 Q3 法說會逐字稿

Good day and welcome to the Blackboxstocks third-quarter 2022 earnings conference call. (Operator Instructions) Please note this event is being recorded. At this time, I would like to turn the conference over to Stephanie Prince of PCG Advisory. Please go ahead.

美好的一天，歡迎參加 Blackboxstocks 2022 年第三季財報電話會議。 （操作員說明）請注意此事件正在被記錄。這次，我想將會議交給 PCG Advisory 的 Stephanie Prince。請繼續。

Thank you, Allison, and welcome to everyone joining us today. On the call with me are Blackboxstocks CEO, Gust Kepler; and Bob Winspear, CFO.

謝謝你，艾莉森，歡迎大家今天加入我們。與我通話的有 Blackboxstocks 執行長 Gust Kepler；和財務長鮑勃溫斯皮爾。

The company would like to remind everyone that various remarks about future expectations, claims, and prospects made on today's call constitute forward-looking statements for purposes of the Safe Harbor provisions under the Private Securities Litigation Reform Act of 1995. Blackboxstocks cautions that these forward-looking statements are subject to risks and uncertainties that may cause their actual results to differ materially from those indicated, including risks described in the company's filings with the SEC.

該公司想提醒大家，在今天的電話會議上發表的有關未來預期、主張和前景的各種言論構成前瞻性陳述，以符合1995 年《私人證券訴訟改革法案》中的安全港條款。Blackboxstocks 警告說，這些前瞻性陳述前瞻性陳述存在風險和不確定性，可能導致其實際結果與所示結果有重大差異，包括該公司向 SEC 提交的文件中所述的風險。

Any forward-looking statements made on this conference call speak only as of today's date, Tuesday, November 15, 2022. Blackboxstocks does not intend to update any of these forward-looking statements to reflect events or circumstances that occur after today. A replay of today's conference call will be available through the Investor Relations section of the company's website at blackboxstocks.com.

本次電話會議中所做的任何前瞻性陳述僅代表今天（2022 年 11 月 15 日星期二）的情況。Blackboxstocks 不打算更新任何這些前瞻性陳述以反映今天之後發生的事件或情況。今天電話會議的重播將透過公司網站 blackboxstocks.com 的投資者關係部分提供。

With that, I'd like to turn the call over to CEO, Gust Kepler.

說到這裡，我想將電話轉給執行長古斯特·開普勒 (Gust Kepler)。

Thank you, Stephanie. I want to thank everyone for joining us today. To get started, as we're all painfully aware, the macroenvironment continues to be difficult. It created headwinds for our company and our core product. The stock market is our market, and it has been a difficult and unpredictable market. Stocks declined 24% in the first nine months of this year. Inflation continues to be a factor that affects our consumers, and the GDP is sluggish and higher interest rates continued to put pressure on growth, at least short-term growth. And all of these trends have created significant headwinds for the market and for our core product.

謝謝你，斯蒂芬妮。我要感謝大家今天加入我們。首先，我們都痛苦地意識到，宏觀環境仍然困難重重。它為我們公司和我們的核心產品帶來了阻力。股票市場是我們的市場，它一直是一個艱難且難以預測的市場。今年前 9 個月，股市下跌 24%。通貨膨脹仍然是影響我們消費者的因素，GDP低迷和較高的利率繼續對成長（至少是短期成長）構成壓力。所有這些趨勢都為市場和我們的核心產品帶來了巨大的阻力。

Speaking more specifically, approximately 80% of our member base trades options. More importantly, most of our members are directional options traders. The current market volatility has made it difficult for this type of option trader to be consistently profitable and that has been very difficult for our user base as of late. To address these market conditions, we've done several things. So let's get out of the gloom and doom of the market and talk about some of the positive things that we've done to counter the current difficulties and headwinds.

更具體地說，我們大約 80% 的會員基礎都交易選擇權。更重要的是，我們的大多數會員都是定向選擇權交易者。目前的市場波動使得這類選擇權交易者很難持續獲利，而這對我們的用戶群來說也是非常困難的。為了應對這些市場狀況，我們做了幾件事。因此，讓我們走出市場的陰霾和厄運，談談我們為應對當前的困難和逆風所做的一些積極的事情。

In March, we did a spring breakout sale. Spring breakout sale introduced a significantly discounted product offering that we've never done before. And we were able to obtain a large number of new users. We repeated this in a Labor Day sale. This also had a very positive effect on our user base, augmenting the user base that we had and some that we've lost. They've attracted new members, but we continue to have a very loyal member base who vote with their wallets and stay with Blackbox because we are the best tool out there for traders in this particular sector.

三月份，我們進行了春季突破銷售。春季突破銷售推出了我們以前從未做過的大幅折扣產品。我們能夠獲得大量的新用戶。我們在勞動節促銷中重複了這一點。這也對我們的用戶群產生了非常正面的影響，擴大了我們現有的用戶群以及我們失去的一些用戶群。他們吸引了新會員，但我們仍然擁有非常忠誠的會員群，他們用錢包投票並留在 Blackbox，因為我們是這個特定領域交易者的最佳工具。

The downside in these heavily discounted programs is that it negatively impacts our short-term revenue, which Bob will discuss further when he has his turn on this call. And again, now that I've got the gloom and doom out of the way, let's talk about the exciting things that lie ahead for Blackbox.

這些大幅折扣計劃的缺點是，它會對我們的短期收入產生負面影響，鮑勃將在輪到他參加本次電話會議時進一步討論這一點。再說一次，既然我已經擺脫了憂鬱和厄運，讓我們來談談 Blackbox 未來令人興奮的事情。

We've been very proactive. We did not wait for a market downturn to begin to diversify and create new products. We have a very talented technology team and we're very forward thinking. So we've created a lot of new features for our core product, and we've created new features for our Pro product that we'll be introducing next year. These new features for our Pro product also transcend into our current retail product.

我們一直非常積極主動。我們沒有等到市場低迷時才開始多元化並創造新產品。我們擁有一支非常有才華的技術團隊，而且我們的思維非常具有前瞻性。因此，我們為我們的核心產品創建了許多新功能，並為我們將於明年推出的 Pro 產品創建了新功能。我們的專業產品的這些新功能也超越了我們目前的零售產品。

Blackbox Pro, specifically, which is our platform that is targeting the professional trader base, that means institutional investors, RIAs, broker-dealers, et cetera, is a very, very useful tool for people that have to trade. We're trying to broaden our market outside the retail investor to the professional trader that must have the very best tools and an edge in the market like we give them.

具體來說，Blackbox Pro 是我們針對專業交易者群體的平台，這意味著機構投資者、RIA、經紀自營商等，對於需要交易的人來說是一個非常非常有用的工具。我們正在努力將我們的市場從散戶投資者擴展到專業交易者，他們必須像我們一樣擁有最好的工具和市場優勢。

We already have firms that are using our product and variations of our product in pilot programs. And I can say that they're very useful to these firms because on the rare occasions, there is some technology glitch, we get a call from them. So we know they use our product daily.

我們已經有一些公司在試點計畫中使用我們的產品和我們產品的變體。我可以說它們對這些公司非常有用，因為在極少數情況下，出現一些技術故障，我們會接到他們的電話。所以我們知道他們每天都使用我們的產品。

We are also augmenting our education program. We recently hired one of our team traders from our community, Jason Swan, to head up our education initiative. Jason does live webinars three times a week for our Blackbox members, and we're putting together a more comprehensive education initiative to better prepare people when they subscribe to our software so they can use it effectively.

我們也擴大了我們的教育計劃。我們最近聘請了社區中的一位團隊交易員 Jason Swan 來領導我們的教育計劃。 Jason 每週為我們的 Blackbox 會員舉辦 3 次現場網路研討會，我們正在製定一項更全面的教育計劃，以便人們在訂閱我們的軟體時更好地做好準備，以便他們能夠有效地使用它。

We're also adding some other significant new features to our product offering. We're adding futures. We're adding new charting programs and additional proprietary alerts We're constantly upgrading our system and a lot of what we do is based on user suggestion. Our member base is very valuable. We have very talented and successful traders and many of the suggestions they make or the observations they make about our platform are things that we incorporate. So we're almost like an open source product in ways because we allow our users to improve our product through suggestion and we implement those suggestions.

我們還在我們的產品中添加了一些其他重要的新功能。我們正在新增期貨。我們正在添加新的圖表程式和其他專有警報。我們正在不斷升級我們的系統，我們所做的很多事情都是基於用戶建議。我們的會員基礎非常寶貴。我們擁有非常有才華和成功的交易者，他們提出的許多建議或對我們平台的觀察都被我們採納。因此，我們在某種程度上幾乎就像一個開源產品，因為我們允許使用者透過建議來改進我們的產品，並且我們實施這些建議。

We also are introducing Stock Nanny, which we've talked about on previous calls. Stock Nanny is a completely different product. It's not designed for traders. It's to address the broader self-directed investor market. This is very important because the day trader market is a small one. And although we have plenty of room for growth in that market, the self-directed investor market is $100 million-plus in the United States alone. And to be specific, Stock Nanny is a product that allows you to import your portfolio from your broker dealer accounts and receive proprietary alerts throughout the trading day when you're on the go to your mobile device via push alert.

我們還推出了股票保姆，我們在之前的電話會議中已經討論過。 Stock Nanny 是一個完全不同的產品。它不是為交易者設計的。這是為了應對更廣泛的自主投資者市場。這點非常重要，因為日間交易者市場很小。儘管我們在該市場有很大的成長空間，但僅在美國，自主投資者市場就超過 1 億美元。具體來說，Stock Nanny 是一款產品，可讓您從經紀商帳戶匯入投資組合，並在整個交易日內透過推播警報在行動裝置上接收專有警報。

These are some unique proprietary features that are not currently offered by brokers or online brokers. We have also slowed or put on hold our crypto initiative for now because the crypto market is in disarray, as everyone knows, and we're not abandoning it in any way, shape or form. We believe that crypto is here to stay, and it's an important part of our product offering long term. But for now, we believe Stock Nanny and Blackbox Pro take precedence over the crypto platform. So we'll be delaying that. We hope to get it out in 2023, but it's not on the top of our priority list as of now.

這些是經紀商或線上經紀商目前不提供的一些獨特的專有功能。我們也暫時放慢或擱置了我們的加密貨幣計劃，因為眾所周知，加密貨幣市場處於混亂狀態，我們不會以任何方式、形式或形式放棄它。我們相信加密貨幣將繼續存在，並且它是我們長期產品提供的重要組成部分。但就目前而言，我們認為 Stock Nanny 和 Blackbox Pro 優先於加密平台。所以我們會推遲這一點。我們希望在 2023 年推出它，但目前它還不是我們的首要任務。

We're continuing to augment our marketing initiatives, and we have a plan to build on the success of some of the promotions that we've done currently. And we're also in the process of launching our Black Friday, Cyber Monday sale, which has been a very effective sale for us for three years in a row now. We had a record December last year.

我們正在繼續加強我們的行銷活動，並且我們制定了一項計劃，以我們目前所做的一些促銷活動的成功為基礎。我們也正在推出黑色星期五、網路星期一促銷活動，這對我們來說已經連續三年非常有效了。去年12月我們創下了紀錄。

And although the market is a significantly different market this year, the stock market specifically, we still believe that this will be a very successful promotion this year. We're already getting a lot of inquiries as to whether we'll be doing it or about to make a big announcement about the new product promotion for Black Friday, Cyber Monday.

儘管今年的市場，特別是股市，是一個顯著不同的市場，但我們仍然相信，今年這將是一次非常成功的促銷。我們已經收到很多詢問，詢問我們是否會這樣做或即將發布有關黑色星期五和網路星期一新產品促銷的重大公告。

In addition to the product upgrades, the promotions, the new marketing initiatives, we continue to believe in our business model, our product, our team, especially the team trainers that are in the community every day that make Blackbox, the successful platform that it is for our users.

除了產品升級、促銷、新的行銷措施之外，我們仍然相信我們的商業模式、我們的產品、我們的團隊，尤其是每天在社群中的團隊培訓師，正是他們讓Blackbox 成為一個成功的平台。是為了我們的用戶。

For this reason, we have our buyback -- stock buyback program still in place. We have bought an additional 116,700 shares this quarter, bringing our total of shares repurchased to 615,728 for a price of just over $1 million. Total authorized program is $2.5 million, and our current pricing in the market definitely makes us still a buyer for our stock. We feel it's very undervalued.

因此，我們的回購—股票回購計劃仍然有效。本季我們又購買了 116,700 股股票，使我們回購的股票總數達到 615,728 股，價格略高於 100 萬美元。授權計劃總額為 250 萬美元，我們目前的市場定價肯定使我們仍然是我們股票的買家。我們覺得它的價值被嚴重低估了。

So although the headwinds have created a less than exciting revenue growth trajectory for us this year, some significant takeaways for our shareholders are we have maintained a stable and loyal user base. We've continued to upgrade and improve our products, and we have pivoted into new markets, or we plan to launch products into new markets and pivoted early in the development stages of these new products, which are Blackbox Pro and Stock Nanny.

因此，儘管今年的逆風為我們帶來了不太令人興奮的收入成長軌跡，但對我們的股東來說，一些重要的收穫是我們保持了穩定和忠誠的用戶群。我們不斷升級和改進我們的產品，我們已經轉向新市場，或者我們計劃將產品推出到新市場，並在這些新產品的開發階段早期轉向，它們是 Blackbox Pro 和 Stock Nanny。

So over this last year, as we've been continuing to invest in our company, our technology, we've developed some amazing products. Our community is strong. We are a very trusted brand. We've been around over seven years live in the market, and we are extremely excited about 2023 to launch our new products and also continue to improve our core product and grow our sales.

因此，去年，隨著我們繼續投資我們的公司和技術，我們開發了一些令人驚嘆的產品。我們的社區很強大。我們是一個非常值得信賴的品牌。我們在市場上已經存在了七年多了，我們對 2023 年推出新產品感到非常興奮，並繼續改進我們的核心產品並增加我們的銷售額。

And with that, I will turn it over to Bob Winspear to go over some of the key accounting components that will further -- provide further detail on my narrative.

接下來，我將把它交給鮑勃溫斯皮爾（Bob Winspear），讓他檢查一些關鍵的會計組成部分，這些組成部分將進一步為我的敘述提供更多細節。

Thanks, Gust, and good morning, everyone. I'm just going to go over a few of the highlighted items, and I'll just refer everyone to our 10-Q that we filed yesterday with the SEC for greater detail on the financial statements and notes and MD&A, et cetera.

謝謝，古斯特，大家早安。我只想回顧一些突出顯示的項目，並請大家參閱我們昨天向 SEC 提交的 10-Q，以了解有關財務報表和附註以及 MD&A 等的更多詳細資訊。

I would like to start with a quick review of our revenue. Revenue for the quarter was approximately $1.2 million. This was down about 17% or $253,000 as compared to the third quarter of 2021. $90,000 of that decline was attributable to a lower subscriber count, but the majority of that decline, about $163,000, was due to a lower average monthly revenue per subscriber. And this was a result of our Labor Day promotion that Gust discussed earlier, in which we offered new subscribers in their first month for just $1 a month as opposed to a regular price of $99.97, and this is what drove that average revenue per subscriber down.

我想先快速回顧一下我們的收入。該季度的營收約為 120 萬美元。與2021 年第三季相比，這一數字下降了約17%，即253,000 美元。其中90,000 美元的下降是由於訂戶數量減少所致，但其中大部分下降（約163,000 美元）是由於每個訂戶的平均月收入較低。這是Gust 之前討論過的勞動節促銷活動的結果，我們在第一個月為新訂閱者提供每月1 美元的優惠，而正常價格為99.97 美元，這就是導致每個訂閱者平均收入下降的原因。

We did a similar promotion, as we discussed, earlier this year with our March breakout promotion for $5 for the first month, but in that time frame, we were able to spread the revenue impact of that lower revenue over the first and second quarter because it happened right at the end of the first quarter. And so we took it over two quarters, whereas this time, we took the entire revenue hit in the third quarter.

正如我們所討論的，今年早些時候，我們進行了類似的促銷活動，第一個月的3 月份突破促銷價為5 美元，但在這段時間內，我們能夠將收入較低的收入影響分散到第一季和第二季度，因為它發生在第一季末。因此，我們在兩個季度內承受了它，而這一次，我們在第三季度承受了全部收入打擊。

For the nine months ended September 30, revenues were $3.9 million as compared to $4.4 million in 2021, a drop about $534,000 or 12%. This drop was driven entirely by the lower average revenue per subscriber as the subscriber count, on average, was up about 3.5% for the year-to-date as compared to 2021. These revenues clearly impacted our gross profit and our gross profit margins as well.

截至 9 月 30 日的九個月，收入為 390 萬美元，而 2021 年為 440 萬美元，下降約 53.4 萬美元，即 12%。這一下降完全是由於每位訂閱者的平均收入較低，因為今年迄今為止的訂閱者數量與 2021 年相比平均增加了約 3.5%。這些收入明顯影響了我們的毛利和毛利率，因為出色地。

Gross profit margins were 60% for the quarter and nine months ended September 30, as compared to margins of 72% and 73% for 2021 periods for the three and nine-month periods. The largest impact on those margin percentages for the quarter and the year to date was a lower average revenue per subscriber. And as we said, that was driven by the promotions. We had some actual cost increases over 2021, and those relate to platform improvements, particularly in the social media chat features, as well as the moderator costs.

截至 9 月 30 日的季度和九個月的毛利率為 60%，而 2021 年三個月和九個月的毛利率分別為 72% 和 73%。對本季和今年迄今的利潤率影響最大的是每位用戶的平均收入下降。正如我們所說，這是由促銷活動所推動的。 2021 年，我們的實際成本有所增加，這些增加與平台改進有關，特別是社交媒體聊天功能以及主持人成本。

Talking about our operating expenses, our operating expenses were $1,924,000 for the third quarter as compared to $1,501,000 in the prior year. Operating expenses for the nine months was $5,707,000, which was 57.6% or $2,085,000 higher than the prior year.

談到我們的營運費用，第三季的營運費用為 1,924,000 美元，而去年同期為 1,501,000 美元。前 9 個月的營運費用為 5,707,000 美元，比前一年增加 57.6%，即 2,085,000 美元。

Looking to the specific elements of those operating expenses, when we first look at SG&A and SG&A was $1,191,000 for the third quarter as compared to $1,098,000 in 2021 and $3,615,000 for the nine-month period as compared to $2,321,000 for the nine months ended 2021, reflecting a pretty consistent level of expense -- spending you see throughout 2022. Compensation, investor, and public relations and other public company-related costs were the primary drivers for the third quarter as well as the year-to-date increases.

看看這些營運費用的具體內容，當我們第一次查看SG&A 時，第三季的SG&A 為1,191,000 美元，而2021 年為1,098,000 美元；九個月期間的SG&A 為3,615,000 美元，而截至2021 年的九個月為2,321,000 美元，反映出支出水平相當穩定——您在2022 年全年都會看到支出。薪酬、投資者、公共關係以及其他與上市公司相關的成本是第三季度以及年初至今增長的主要驅動力。

Looking at research and development. R&D increased to $302,000 from $112,000 in the third quarter of last year, and our year-to-date development costs were $832,000 as compared to $445,000 for the prior year. These are the largest increases in our operating expenses on a percentage basis, increasing by 87% year to date.

著眼於研發。研發費用從去年第三季的 112,000 美元增加到 302,000 美元，今年迄今的開發成本為 832,000 美元，而前一年為 445,000 美元。以百分比計算，這是我們營運費用增幅最大的一次，今年迄今成長了 87%。

And that's as we expected, as Gust noted, we've made considerable investments in upgrading our infrastructure, adding product features and enhancements, and for the development of all the new products. And earlier in the part of the year, a significant portion of our R&D expense was related to the development of our mobile app, which we released in April.

正如古斯特所指出的，這正如我們所預期的那樣，我們在升級基礎設施、添加產品功能和增強功能以及開發所有新產品方面進行了大量投資。今年早些時候，我們研發費用的很大一部分與我們四月份發布的行動應用程式的開發有關。

Advertising expenses for the year were -- or for the quarter were $417,000 for the third quarter, which was $131,000 higher than 2021. Our year-to-date advertising expenses were $1,243,000, which was 48% or $402,000 higher in 2021. We're seeing higher CPA costs over the year, particularly in the current quarter, and some of the current quarter can be attributable to political ads, which take up a lot of the advertising, particularly in the digital market area where we spend our money.

第三季今年或本季的廣告費用為 417,000 美元，比 2021 年高出 131,000 美元。我們年初至今的廣告費用為 1,243,000 美元，比 2021 年增加了 48% 或 402,000 美元。全年註冊會計師成本，尤其是在本季度，而本季度的部分時間可歸因於政治廣告，政治廣告佔據了大量廣告，特別是在我們花錢的數位市場領域。

Our second quarter expenses included about $153,000 or so that we spent on a series of TV spots, which were targeted more towards brand awareness than our traditional digital marketing things. Nevertheless, the marketing and advertising expenses are going to be areas that we're going to be working to improve on with respect to getting improved CPA and better cost effectiveness.

我們第二季的支出包括大約 153,000 美元左右，我們花在一系列電視廣告上，這些電視廣告的目標更多的是品牌知名度，而不是傳統的數位行銷。儘管如此，行銷和廣告費用將是我們將努力改進的領域，以提高每次轉換成本和更好的成本效益。

Looking at the EBITDA, obviously, you can see with the revenue and gross margin issues that we discussed as well as the higher expenses, you would expect EBITDA to come down, which it did. EBITDA was negative $1,076,000 for the quarter and a similar $3,006,000 for the nine months ended September 30 as compared to a slightly negative EBITDA in the third quarter of 2021 and a slightly positive EBITDA for the nine months in 2021.

看看 EBITDA，顯然，你可以看到我們討論的收入和毛利率問題以及更高的費用，你會期望 EBITDA 會下降，事實確實如此。本季 EBITDA 為負 1,076,000 美元，截至 9 月 30 日的九個月為負 3,006,000 美元，而 2021 年第三季 EBITDA 略為負，2021 年 9 個月 EBITDA 略為正值。

Looking at our balance sheet and some of our cash flow items, we still have a strong level of cash and marketable securities of about $5.3 million at the end of the quarter. Just after the quarter, on Monday, we repaid our senior secured loan, which matured on Monday, which was on our books at $890,000 at September 30.

看看我們的資產負債表和一些現金流項目，截至本季末，我們仍然擁有約 530 萬美元的大量現金和有價證券。就在本季結束後的周一，我們償還了週一到期的優先擔保貸款，截至 9 月 30 日，我們帳面上的貸款金額為 89 萬美元。

Year to date, we have repurchased a total of $1,065,000 of treasury stock, as Gust had mentioned, and we don't expect to be able to utilize the full $2.5 million authorization before it expires at year-end. Other capital expenditures and non-operating items were fairly minimal for the year, and we don't foresee any significant changes there. We remain very excited about the balance of 2022 and looking into 2023.

正如古斯特所提到的，今年迄今為止，我們已經回購了總計 1,065,000 美元的庫存股，我們預計在年底到期之前無法使用全部 250 萬美元的授權。今年其他資本支出和非經營項目相當少，我們預計不會有任何重大變化。我們對 2022 年的剩餘時間和展望 2023 年仍然感到非常興奮。

We're especially looking forward to launching the new products that target new market segments and increased our addressable market. I would like to say thanks for all our stockholders for continued support to us as well as our subscribers and members and of course, the entire Blackbox team.

我們特別期待推出針對新細分市場並擴大我們的潛在市場的新產品。我想感謝所有股東對我們以及我們的訂戶和會員，當然還有整個 Blackbox 團隊的持續支持。

With that, I'll open it up for questions.

有了這個，我將打開它來提問。

(Operator Instructions) Joe Gomes, Noble Capital Markets.

（操作員說明）Joe Gomes，Noble Capital Markets。

Good morning, everyone. This is Joshua Zoepfel filling in for Joe Gomes. So I just have -- firstly, on the Stock Nanny and the Pro, are we still kind of on track for early '23 release on that? And then looking at the development expenses for those, how should we look at that over like the next few quarters, roughly where we are at now?

大家，早安。我是約書亞‧佐普菲爾 (Joshua Zoepfel)，接替喬‧戈麥斯 (Joe Gomes)。所以我只是 - 首先，關於 Stock Nanny 和 Pro，我們是否仍然預計在 23 年初發布？然後看看這些的開發費用，我們該如何看待接下來的幾個季度，大概是我們現在的狀況？

I'll answer that. Most of the development costs are in the staffing up of our engineering team. So they've already occurred over the course of the last three quarters. So I don't expect a significant increase in cost for finishing these products. We're well on our way to completing them. So supporting them is a different story, but I don't expect a large increase in cost for support of these products, especially Stock Nanny, it's a much lower maintenance product than our current core product.

我會回答這個問題。大部分開發成本都花在我們工程團隊的人員配置。所以它們在過去三個季度已經發生了。因此，我預計完成這些產品的成本不會顯著增加。我們正在順利完成這些任務。因此，支持它們是另一回事，但我預計這些產品的支援成本不會大幅增加，尤其是 Stock Nanny，它是一個比我們當前核心產品低得多的維護產品。

Okay. Yeah. And we're still -- are they still really on track for that early 2023 release, those products?

好的。是的。我們仍然 - 這些產品是否真的仍有望在 2023 年初發布？

Stock Nanny is on track for the release in first quarter of 2023, and we believe the Pro will come out in the second quarter.

Stock Nanny 預計將於 2023 年第一季發布，我們相信 Pro 版將在第二季發布。

Okay. Great. And I guess, as for these products themselves, like how will the company just be marketing them to attract new clients? And obviously, you guys mentioned the Black Friday and Cyber Monday promotion but is there anything else that maybe you guys are looking ahead at?

好的。偉大的。我想，就這些產品本身而言，公司將如何行銷它們以吸引新客戶？顯然，你們提到了黑色星期五和網路星期一促銷活動，但是你們還有什麼其他的期待嗎？

Stock Nanny will be market -- marketed digitally. We have -- the business development strategy for Blackbox Pro, where we are doing some R&D pilot programs with various broker-dealers and financial institutions, gathering data and info on what their use case is. And by doing so, we're making introductions and relationships. So the strategy with the Pro is a little different than our go-to-market strategies for retail investors, but there will be digital marketing associated with the Pro as well. So it's somewhat of a hybrid approach on the Pro and Stock Nanny will be in our traditional marketing vein, which is digital.

庫存保姆將進入市場——以數位方式進行行銷。我們有 Blackbox Pro 的業務發展策略，我們正在與各種經紀交易商和金融機構進行一些研發試點項目，收集有關他們用例的數據和資訊。透過這樣做，我們正在建立介紹和關係。因此，Pro 的策略與我們針對散戶投資者的進入市場策略略有不同，但 Pro 也將進行數位行銷。因此，這在某種程度上是 Pro 和 Stock Nanny 的混合方法，將採用我們傳統的數位行銷方式。

Okay. Great. And then I think -- and I guess it's really comfortable with just with the cash position you're in now? Or are you guys looking really into anything like raising any additional funds?

好的。偉大的。然後我想──我想你對現在的現金狀況真的很滿意嗎？或者你們真的在考慮籌集額外資金之類的事情嗎？

We believe that we have a strong cash position and a lot of the expenditures have been in the development of these new products, and we have not released them yet, so we had not realized any revenue from them. So we expect our cash position to improve as our revenues grow with the new product launches.

我們認為，我們擁有強大的現金狀況，並且大量支出都用於開發這些新產品，而我們尚未發布它們，因此我們尚未從中實現任何收入。因此，隨著新產品的推出，我們的收入不斷增長，我們預計我們的現金狀況將會改善。

Okay. Great. Thank you. (multiple speakers)

好的。偉大的。謝謝。 （多個發言者）

And to answer to your question, we don't have any -- I'm sorry, we don't have any current plans for additional capital raise.

回答你的問題，我們沒有任何計劃——很抱歉，我們目前沒有任何額外融資的計劃。

Okay. Great. Thank you. And then I guess last one, if I may. I noticed given the current market conditions there are -- are you guys really seeing good retention and just current clients? Are you guys really able to quantify this really at all?

好的。偉大的。謝謝。如果可以的話，我猜最後一個。我注意到，考慮到當前的市場狀況，你們真的看到了良好的保留率和現有客戶嗎？你們真的能夠量化這一點嗎？

We have seen a larger churn rate when the markets get choppy or volatile, as I described, most of our -- in my earlier narrative, most of our traders are directional options traders, and it's been a difficult market for them to navigate. Our more experienced traders, not only stay with us, but a lot of them upgrade to annual memberships, and that's part of our strategy when we do this Black Friday, Cyber Monday promotion.

正如我所描述的，當市場波動或波動時，我們會看到更大的流失率，在我之前的敘述中，我們的大多數交易員都是定向選擇權交易員，這對他們來說是一個很難駕馭的市場。我們經驗豐富的交易者不僅留在我們身邊，而且其中許多人都升級為年度會員，這是我們進行黑色星期五和網路星期一促銷活動時策略的一部分。

So to be 100% transparent, the market does affect our member base, but we have maintained a stable member base, and we expect to grow our member base with these new products that are not entirely reliant on day traders that make a living trading every day.

因此，為了100%透明，市場確實會影響我們的會員基礎，但我們保持了穩定的會員基礎，我們希望透過這些新產品來擴大我們的會員基礎，這些新產品不完全依賴每天以交易為生的日內交易者。天。

The new products are focused on either professional traders that have to have tools because they don't have the luxury of deciding they're going to sit out the market for a quarter or a year until it comes back. They have to trade. So they need the advantage that our products provide.

新產品主要針對那些必須擁有工具的專業交易者，因為他們無法決定在市場回歸之前他們將退出市場一個季度或一年。他們必須進行交易。因此他們需要我們產品提供的優勢。

Stock Nanny is a different type of product as well because most people that are investors a lot of times find value in markets decrease and come in and buy what they consider undervalued stocks. They still need to monitor their positions. And the Stock Nanny product is a portfolio monitoring rather than a day trading tool. So we believe it will be very valuable to portfolio holders or self-directed investors, which, again, I'll repeat is a much larger demographic than the day trader market that we currently serve.

股票保母也是不同類型的產品，因為大多數投資者很多時候發現市場價值下降，並買入他們認為被低估的股票。他們仍然需要監控自己的立場。股票保母產品是一個投資組合監控而不是日間交易工具。因此，我們相信這對投資組合持有者或自主投資者來說非常有價值，我再次重申，他們的人口規模比我們目前服務的日內交易者市場大得多。

Okay. Great. Yeah, thank you for answering my questions and good job on the quarter, guys.

好的。偉大的。是的，謝謝你們回答我的問題，夥計們，本季工作做得很好。

Thank you.

謝謝。

Thank you.

謝謝。

(Operator Instructions) Ed Woo, Ascendiant Capital.

（操作員指令）Ed Woo，Ascendiant Capital。

Yeah. Thank you for answering my question. You said that this market is not good for the directional option traders, but obviously, it's very good for short -- people who are short to market. Have you been putting more focus on products that will make money during down market and get that out to your customer base?

是的。謝謝你回答我的問題。你說這個市場對於定向選擇交易者來說並不好，但顯然，對於做空者——那些做空市場的人來說，這是非常好的。您是否更加關注能夠在市場低迷時期賺錢的產品並將其推廣給您的客戶群？

Our marketing message to new subscribers or potential new members is that you can make money betting against the market. But to be more specific, directional options traders find it difficult. Premiums on options are much higher when volatility is high, so it's harder to be profitable. So while there is a benefit to people that know how to bet against the market or short the market, be it stock traders or options traders, it's still a difficult market for the majority of our user base, which is 80% directional options traders.

我們向新訂閱者或潛在新會員傳達的行銷訊息是，您可以透過做空市場賺錢。但更具體地說，定向選擇權交易者發現這很困難。當波動性較高時，選擇權費會更高，因此更難獲利。因此，雖然對於知道如何做空市場或做空市場的人（無論是股票交易者還是期權交易者）來說有好處，但對於我們的大多數用戶群（80% 是定向期權交易者）來說，這仍然是一個困難的市場。

Great. And then talk about international opportunities. Are you able to focus on getting more international customers? Or is that also still very challenging?

偉大的。然後談談國際機會。您能專注於吸引更多國際客戶嗎？或者說這仍然非常具有挑戰性？

We haven't seen a rise or decline in international users. We're currently in approximately 42 countries. We're not seeing a large concentration of new users in a particular region. The US stock market tends to be the leading market in the world and the international members that we currently have are affected in the same way that our domestic members are affected.

我們沒有看到國際用戶的增加或減少。目前我們的業務遍及大約 42 個國家。我們沒有看到新用戶大量集中在特定地區。美國股市往往是全球領先的市場，我們目前的國際會員受到的影響與我們國內會員受到的影響是一樣的。

So to answer your question, we don't see -- we haven't seen a large rise in any particular sector in the international markets. But we are -- we do have future plans to add additional exchanges, and we are adding futures to our platform, which will provide a new avenue for traders outside of just the options and stock trading that we currently offer.

因此，回答你的問題，我們沒有看到國際市場上任何特定行業出現大幅上漲。但我們確實有未來計劃增加更多交易所，並且我們正在向我們的平台添加期貨，這將為交易者提供我們目前提供的選擇權和股票交易之外的新途徑。

For the futures, are that commodities and currencies?

對期貨來說，是商品還是貨幣？

We are -- we have a specific set that we'll be announcing, like top 16, I believe that we're going to introduce first, so we may add more as we go. I don't have specifics on all of the futures that we will be adding at this point.

我們有一個特定的系列將要宣布，例如前 16 名，我相信我們將首先推出，所以我們可能會添加更多。我目前還沒有關於我們將添加的所有期貨的具體資訊。

Great. Well, thanks for answering my question. (multiple speakers)

偉大的。嗯，謝謝你回答我的問題。 （多個發言者）

I wish you guys good luck. Thank you.

祝你們好運。謝謝。

Thanks, Ed.

謝謝，艾德。

Ladies and gentlemen, at this time, we will conclude our question-and-answer session. I'd like to turn the conference back over to Gust Kepler, CEO, for any closing remarks.

女士們、先生們，我們的問答環節到此結束。我想將會議轉回執行長古斯特·開普勒 (Gust Kepler) 致閉幕詞。

Thank you. Again, we'd like to thank all of our shareholders for their support and the confidence they've had in us as we navigate this unusual market. And I also want to thank our team traders who are in the market every day guiding our users, helping them in difficult market situations and, ultimately, helping a lot of new members become very profitable even in these somewhat challenging conditions.

謝謝。再次，我們要感謝所有股東在我們駕馭這個不尋常的市場時給予我們的支持和信任。我還要感謝我們的團隊交易員，他們每天都在市場上指導我們的用戶，在困難的市場情況下幫助他們，並​​最終幫助許多新會員即使在這些有些具有挑戰性的條件下也能獲得豐厚的利潤。

So our team traders, our developers, and our corporate team, I want to thank everybody at Blackbox for making Blackbox a leader in its category for another year, and we are looking forward to a very exciting and prosperous 2023 with our core products and our new products.

因此，我們的團隊交易員、我們的開發人員和我們的企業團隊，我要感謝Blackbox 的每一個人，讓Blackbox 再次成為該類別的領導者，我們期待著憑藉我們的核心產品和我們的產品迎來一個非常令人興奮和繁榮的2023 年。新產品。

And the conference has now concluded. We do thank you for attending today's presentation. You may now disconnect your lines.

會議現已結束。我們非常感謝您參加今天的演講。現在您可以斷開線路。