Stay the course
We have analyzed potential price controls which the government may impose on
private hospitals and deem them as mildly negative to earnings at best. We don’t
think a drug margin limit will directly result in lower profitability as hospitals may
offset such measures by raising other fees. We recommend investors to stay the
course as we note Thai hospital shares remain inexpensive on a regional basis
given their bright long-term outlook.
Hospital pricing practices now under government scrutiny
Since talk of price controls on private hospitals began a month ago, BDMS’s share
price has fallen by 4.5% vs. a 2.8% decline in the SET Index. We believe investors
have partially priced-in lower hospital profitability as a result of stricter
government controls. However, we see limited downside to core profitability of
hospitals under our coverage as we believe no damaging measures will be
implemented.
Drug margin review, not a reduction
We don’t expect drug margin limits to be introduced at private hospitals and
don’t believe new regulations on how hospitals display their fees (see Figure 4)
will change hospitals’ pricing structure. However, should that not be the case, we
see more downside to BDMS than BH as the former’s patients are likely more
price sensitive.
Our target prices are based on SOTP/DCF; key risks
We keep our target prices unchanged but revise BH’s 2015F earnings up by 6% to
reflect stronger-than-expected 1Q15 results. We continue to see a better riskreward
trade-off for BDMS over BH. We value both stocks using discounted cash
flows and look at EV/EBITDA as well as their growth outlook (see pg.5). BH is now
trading at 23x EV/EBITDA, higher than BDMS despite a more lackluster EBITDA
growth due to limited margin uplift. We see scope for BDMS to outperform BH
over the next 12 months. Risks includes M&A activity and stronger than expected
medical tourist volume for BH (see pg. 6).