We're Not Worried About Vir Biotechnology's (NASDAQ:VIR) Cash Burn

There's no doubt that money can be made by owning shares of unprofitable businesses. 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. But while the successes are well known, investors should not ignore the very many unprofitable companies that simply burn through all their cash and collapse.

So should Vir Biotechnology (NASDAQ:VIR) shareholders be worried about its cash burn? In this article, we define cash burn as its annual (negative) free cash flow, which is the amount of money a company spends each year to fund its growth. Let's start with an examination of the business' cash, relative to its cash burn.

See our latest analysis for Vir Biotechnology

Does Vir Biotechnology Have A Long Cash Runway?

A company's cash runway is calculated by dividing its cash hoard by its cash burn. In June 2021, Vir Biotechnology had US$826m in cash, and was debt-free. In the last year, its cash burn was US$88m. Therefore, from June 2021 it had 9.4 years of cash runway. Even though this is but one measure of the company's cash burn, the thought of such a long cash runway warms our bellies in a comforting way. The image below shows how its cash balance has been changing over the last few years.

How Well Is Vir Biotechnology Growing?

It was fairly positive to see that Vir Biotechnology reduced its cash burn by 37% during the last year. But the operating revenue growth of 143% was even better. We think it is growing rather well, upon reflection. 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 Hard Would It Be For Vir Biotechnology To Raise More Cash For Growth?

While Vir Biotechnology seems to be in a decent position, we reckon it is still worth thinking about how easily it could raise more cash, if that proved desirable. Companies can raise capital through either debt or equity. Commonly, a business will sell new shares in itself to raise cash and drive growth. By comparing a company's annual cash burn to its total market capitalisation, we can estimate roughly how many shares it would have to issue in order to run the company for another year (at the same burn rate).

Vir Biotechnology's cash burn of US$88m is about 1.3% of its US$6.8b market capitalisation. So it could almost certainly just borrow a little to fund another year's growth, or else easily raise the cash by issuing a few shares.

Is Vir Biotechnology's Cash Burn A Worry?

As you can probably tell by now, we're not too worried about Vir Biotechnology's cash burn. In particular, we think its revenue growth stands out as evidence that the company is well on top of its spending. Its cash burn reduction 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. On another note, we conducted an in-depth investigation of the company, and identified 4 warning signs for Vir Biotechnology (1 doesn't sit too well with us!) that you should be aware of before investing here.

Of course Vir Biotechnology 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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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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