In order to justify the effort of selecting individual stocks, it’s worth striving to beat the returns from a market index fund. But every investor is virtually certain to have both over-performing and under-performing stocks. At this point some shareholders may be questioning their investment in Crossland Strategic Metals Limited (ASX:CUX), since the last five years saw the share price fall 40%.
Check out our latest analysis for Crossland Strategic Metals
We don’t think Crossland Strategic Metals’s revenue of AU$1,084 is enough to establish significant demand. You have to wonder why venture capitalists aren’t funding it. As a result, we think it’s unlikely shareholders are paying much attention to current revenue, but rather speculating on growth in the years to come. For example, investors may be hoping that Crossland Strategic Metals finds some valuable resources, before it runs out of money.
Companies that lack both meaningful revenue and profits are usually considered high risk. You should be aware that there is always a chance that this sort of company will need to issue more shares to raise money to continue pursuing its business plan. While some such companies do very well over the long term, others become hyped up by promoters before eventually falling back down to earth, and going bankrupt (or being recapitalized).
Our data indicates that Crossland Strategic Metals had net debt of AU$1,683,000 when it last reported in June 2018. That makes it extremely high risk, in our view. But since the share price has dived -9.7% per year, over 5 years, it looks like some investors think it’s time to abandon ship, so to speak. You can see in the image below, how Crossland Strategic Metals’s cash and debt levels have changed over time (click to see the values).
It can be extremely risky to invest in a company that doesn’t even have revenue. There’s no way to know its value easily. Given that situation, would you be concerned if it turned out insiders were relentlessly selling stock? I’d like that just about as much as I like to drink milk and fruit juice mixed together. It costs nothing but a moment of your time to see if we are picking up on any insider selling.
A Different Perspective
It’s nice to see that Crossland Strategic Metals shareholders have received a total shareholder return of 20% over the last year. There’s no doubt those recent returns are much better than the TSR loss of 9.7% per year over five years. The long term loss makes us cautious, but the short term TSR gain certainly hints at a brighter future. Shareholders might want to examine this detailed historical graph of past earnings, revenue and cash flow.