Can someone explain to me Carvana’s debt restructuring?


Current Position: None
Considering buying puts but have a few questions for this sub.

Can someone tell me what carvana did when they announced “debt restructuring”? And secondly, how did they show it on their balance sheets? I know that because of the debt restructuring, they showed a “profit” but I did not understand how they did that.

Another thing I could not understand on Carvana’s reports is that they talk about the profit they made on cars they sold (Gross Profit per Unit or GPU) but they don’t talk about what cars they bought and what their inventory is, etc. I think the company is scamming investors because here is my analysis of what is happening.

1) They buy your car that’s worth 30K for 35K to incentivise you to sell to them rather than a dealership
2) Then they need to sell that car for 40K to show their high GPU so they will give the next buyer a higher value on their trade in. For example, I have a 20k car, I go to carvana, they offer me 27K for my car and 40k for their car. Since my net out of pocket is less, I don’t mind paying 40K for the car that’s maybe worth 35K as I gained more on my car trade in. This is how they prop up the GPU.
3) But now they have inventory of cars that they bought at much higher prices and they can only do the above scam N number of times before everyone starts questioning.

Another less important question than the above 2 – If you were someone that believed in the above thesis, what would you do to make money off of it?

Thanks!


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