Companies Like Rua Bioscience (NZSE:RUA) Are In A Position To Invest In Growth
We can readily understand why investors are attracted to unprofitable companies. For example, biotech and mining exploration companies often lose money for years before finding success with a new treatment or mineral discovery. But while history lauds those rare successes, those that fail are often forgotten; who remembers Pets.com?
So, the natural question for Rua Bioscience (NZSE:RUA) shareholders is whether they should be concerned by its rate of cash burn. For the purposes of this article, cash burn is the annual rate at which an unprofitable company spends cash to fund its growth; its negative free cash flow. The first step is to compare its cash burn with its cash reserves, to give us its 'cash runway'.
View our latest analysis for Rua Bioscience
When Might Rua Bioscience Run Out Of Money?
A company's cash runway is calculated by dividing its cash hoard by its cash burn. As at December 2021, Rua Bioscience had cash of NZ$12m and such minimal debt that we can ignore it for the purposes of this analysis. Looking at the last year, the company burnt through NZ$6.8m. Therefore, from December 2021 it had roughly 22 months of cash runway. That's not too bad, but it's fair to say the end of the cash runway is in sight, unless cash burn reduces drastically. The image below shows how its cash balance has been changing over the last few years.
How Is Rua Bioscience's Cash Burn Changing Over Time?
Because Rua Bioscience isn't currently generating revenue, we consider it an early-stage business. Nonetheless, we can still examine its cash burn trajectory as part of our assessment of its cash burn situation. As it happens, the company's cash burn reduced by 2.7% over the last year, which suggests that management are maintaining a fairly steady rate of business development, albeit with a slight decrease in spending. Rua Bioscience makes us a little nervous due to its lack of substantial operating revenue. So we'd generally prefer stocks from this list of stocks that have analysts forecasting growth.
How Easily Can Rua Bioscience Raise Cash?
While Rua Bioscience is showing a solid reduction in its cash burn, it's still worth considering how easily it could raise more cash, even just to fuel faster growth. Issuing new shares, or taking on debt, are the most common ways for a listed company to raise more money for its business. Many companies end up issuing new shares to fund future growth. We can compare a company's cash burn to its market capitalisation to get a sense for how many new shares a company would have to issue to fund one year's operations.
Since it has a market capitalisation of NZ$47m, Rua Bioscience's NZ$6.8m in cash burn equates to about 14% of its market value. Given that situation, it's fair to say the company wouldn't have much trouble raising more cash for growth, but shareholders would be somewhat diluted.
Is Rua Bioscience's Cash Burn A Worry?
Rua Bioscience appears to be in pretty good health when it comes to its cash burn situation. Not only was its cash burn relative to its market cap quite good, but its cash runway was a real positive. Cash burning companies are always on the riskier side of things, but after considering all of the factors discussed in this short piece, we're not too worried about its rate of cash burn. Taking a deeper dive, we've spotted 4 warning signs for Rua Bioscience you should be aware of, and 1 of them doesn't sit too well with us.
Of course Rua Bioscience may not be the best stock to buy. So you may wish to see this free collection of companies boasting high return on equity, or this list of stocks that insiders are buying.
Have feedback on this article? Concerned about the content? Get in touch with us directly. Alternatively, email editorial-team (at) simplywallst.com.
This article by Simply Wall St is general in nature. We provide commentary based on historical data and analyst forecasts only using an unbiased methodology and our articles are not intended to be financial advice. It does not constitute a recommendation to buy or sell any stock, and does not take account of your objectives, or your financial situation. We aim to bring you long-term focused analysis driven by fundamental data. Note that our analysis may not factor in the latest price-sensitive company announcements or qualitative material. Simply Wall St has no position in any stocks mentioned.
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