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Here's Why Pascal Biosciences (CVE:PAS) Must Use Its Cash Wisely

Even when a business is losing money, it's possible for shareholders to make money if they buy a good business at the right price. For example, although Amazon.com made losses for many years after listing, if you had bought and held the shares since 1999, you would have made a fortune. Nonetheless, only a fool would ignore the risk that a loss making company burns through its cash too quickly.

So, the natural question for Pascal Biosciences (CVE:PAS) 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. Let's start with an examination of the business's cash, relative to its cash burn.

See our latest analysis for Pascal Biosciences

How Long Is Pascal Biosciences's Cash Runway?

A company's cash runway is calculated by dividing its cash hoard by its cash burn. In May 2019, Pascal Biosciences had CA$1.6m in cash, and was debt-free. Looking at the last year, the company burnt through CA$3.3m. Therefore, from May 2019 it had roughly 6 months of cash runway. That's a very short cash runway which indicates an imminent need to douse the cash burn or find more funding. You can see how its cash balance has changed over time in the image below.

TSXV:PAS Historical Debt, October 2nd 2019
TSXV:PAS Historical Debt, October 2nd 2019

How Is Pascal Biosciences's Cash Burn Changing Over Time?

Pascal Biosciences didn't record any revenue over the last year, indicating that it's an early stage company still developing its business. Nonetheless, we can still examine its cash burn trajectory as part of our assessment of its cash burn situation. In fact, it ramped its spending strongly over the last year, increasing cash burn by 118%. That sort of spending growth rate can't continue for very long before it causes balance sheet weakness, generally speaking. Pascal Biosciences 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 Hard Would It Be For Pascal Biosciences To Raise More Cash For Growth?

Since its cash burn is moving in the wrong direction, Pascal Biosciences shareholders may wish to think ahead to when the company may need to raise more cash. Generally speaking, a listed business can raise new cash through issuing shares or taking on debt. One of the main advantages held by publicly listed companies is that they can sell shares to investors to raise cash to fund 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.

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Since it has a market capitalisation of CA$7.9m, Pascal Biosciences's CA$3.3m in cash burn equates to about 42% of its market value. From this perspective, it seems that the company spent a hugh amount relative to its market value, and we'd be very wary of a painful capital raising.

So, Should We Worry About Pascal Biosciences's Cash Burn?

As you can probably tell by now, we're rather concerned about Pascal Biosciences's cash burn. Take, for example, its cash runway, which suggests the company may have difficulty funding itself, in the future. And although we accept its cash burn relative to its market cap wasn't as worrying as its cash runway, it was still a real negative; as indeed were all the factors we considered in this article. Once we consider the metrics mentioned in this article together, we're left with very little confidence in the company's ability to manage its cash burn, and we think it will probably need more money. While we always like to monitor cash burn for early stage companies, qualitative factors such as the CEO pay can also shed light on the situation. Click here to see free what the Pascal Biosciences CEO is paid..

Of course Pascal Biosciences 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.

We aim to bring you long-term focused research analysis driven by fundamental data. Note that our analysis may not factor in the latest price-sensitive company announcements or qualitative material.

If you spot an error that warrants correction, please contact the editor at editorial-team@simplywallst.com. This article by Simply Wall St is general in nature. It does not constitute a recommendation to buy or sell any stock, and does not take account of your objectives, or your financial situation. Simply Wall St has no position in the stocks mentioned. Thank you for reading.