This is measured by a figure called free cash flow, a measure of the cash produced that is free to be used by the firm for whatever they want. If Pinduoduo is free cash flow positive they’ll likely be able to continue their growth spend and get even larger. If its free cash flow negative, the growth plan will put too much strain on their cash position and, it will eventually fail. Restricted cash cannot be included in free cash flow, because it isn’t freely usable by the company. According to “Note 2: Summary of Significant Accounting Policies” in Pinduoduo’s IPO prospectus: “Restricted cash represents cash received from consumers and reserved in a bank supervised account for payments to merchants.” Restricted cash is not freely usable and therefore should be excluded from free cash flow.