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We're Not Worried About Nurix Therapeutics' (NASDAQ:NRIX) Cash Burn
There's no doubt that money can be made by owning shares of unprofitable businesses. For example, biotech and mining exploration companies often lose money for years before finding success with a new treatment or mineral discovery. But the harsh reality is that very many loss making companies burn through all their cash and go bankrupt.
So should Nurix Therapeutics (NASDAQ:NRIX) shareholders be worried about its 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'.
Check out our latest analysis for Nurix Therapeutics
Does Nurix Therapeutics Have A Long Cash Runway?
A company's cash runway is the amount of time it would take to burn through its cash reserves at its current cash burn rate. As at May 2021, Nurix Therapeutics had cash of US$386m and no debt. Importantly, its cash burn was US$56m over the trailing twelve months. Therefore, from May 2021 it had 6.9 years of cash runway. While this is only one measure of its cash burn situation, it certainly gives us the impression that holders have nothing to worry about. Depicted below, you can see how its cash holdings have changed over time.
Is Nurix Therapeutics' Revenue Growing?
Given that Nurix Therapeutics actually had positive free cash flow last year, before burning cash this year, we'll focus on its operating revenue to get a measure of the business trajectory. Although it's hardly brilliant growth, it's good to see the company grew revenue by 17% in the last year. While the past is always worth studying, it is the future that matters most of all. So you might want to take a peek at how much the company is expected to grow in the next few years.
Can Nurix Therapeutics Raise More Cash Easily?
While Nurix Therapeutics is showing solid revenue growth, 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. Commonly, a business will sell new shares in itself to raise cash and drive 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.
Nurix Therapeutics' cash burn of US$56m is about 4.1% of its US$1.4b market capitalisation. That's a low proportion, so we figure the company would be able to raise more cash to fund growth, with a little dilution, or even to simply borrow some money.
Is Nurix Therapeutics' Cash Burn A Worry?
As you can probably tell by now, we're not too worried about Nurix Therapeutics' cash burn. For example, we think its cash runway suggests that the company is on a good path. Its revenue growth wasn't quite as good, but was still rather encouraging! After considering a range of factors in this article, we're pretty relaxed about its cash burn, since the company seems to be in a good position to continue to fund its growth. Separately, we looked at different risks affecting the company and spotted 3 warning signs for Nurix Therapeutics (of which 1 is concerning!) you should know about.
Of course Nurix Therapeutics 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.
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About NasdaqGM:NRIX
Nurix Therapeutics
A clinical stage biopharmaceutical company, focuses on the discovery, development, and commercialization of small molecule and cell therapies for the treatment of cancer, inflammatory conditions, and other diseases.
Flawless balance sheet low.