Is Idera Pharmaceuticals (NASDAQ:IDRA) In A Good Position To Deliver On Growth Plans?

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. By way of example, Idera Pharmaceuticals (NASDAQ:IDRA) has seen its share price rise 167% over the last year, delighting many shareholders. Having said that, unprofitable companies are risky because they could potentially burn through all their cash and become distressed.

So notwithstanding the buoyant share price, we think it's well worth asking whether Idera Pharmaceuticals' cash burn is too risky. For the purpose of this article, we'll define cash burn as the amount of cash the company is spending each year to fund its growth (also called its negative free cash flow). We'll start by comparing its cash burn with its cash reserves in order to calculate its cash runway.

View our latest analysis for Idera Pharmaceuticals

How Long Is Idera Pharmaceuticals' Cash Runway?

A company's cash runway is calculated by dividing its cash hoard by its cash burn. As at December 2020, Idera Pharmaceuticals had cash of US$38m and such minimal debt that we can ignore it for the purposes of this analysis. In the last year, its cash burn was US$34m. That means it had a cash runway of around 13 months as of December 2020. 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. Importantly, if we extrapolate recent cash burn trends, the cash runway would be noticeably longer. The image below shows how its cash balance has been changing over the last few years.

How Is Idera Pharmaceuticals' Cash Burn Changing Over Time?

Idera Pharmaceuticals didn't record any revenue over the last year, indicating that it's an early stage company still developing its business. So while we can't look to sales to understand growth, we can look at how the cash burn is changing to understand how expenditure is trending over time. While it hardly paints a picture of imminent growth, the fact that it has reduced its cash burn by 24% over the last year suggests some degree of prudence. Clearly, however, the crucial factor is whether the company will grow its business going forward. For that reason, it makes a lot of sense to take a look at our analyst forecasts for the company.

How Easily Can Idera Pharmaceuticals Raise Cash?

While Idera Pharmaceuticals 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. One of the main advantages held by publicly listed companies is that they can sell shares to investors to raise cash and 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.

Idera Pharmaceuticals' cash burn of US$34m is about 19% of its US$176m market capitalisation. 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 Idera Pharmaceuticals' Cash Burn A Worry?

The good news is that in our view Idera Pharmaceuticals' cash burn situation gives shareholders real reason for optimism. One the one hand we have its solid cash runway, while on the other it can also boast very strong cash burn reduction. We don't think its cash burn is particularly problematic, but after considering the range of factors in this article, we do think shareholders should be monitoring how it changes over time. Taking a deeper dive, we've spotted 5 warning signs for Idera Pharmaceuticals you should be aware of, and 2 of them are concerning.

Of course, you might find a fantastic investment by looking elsewhere. So take a peek at this free list of interesting companies, and this list of stocks growth stocks (according to analyst forecasts)

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