I hope that's ok :-) If not, please let me know.
Struggling medical equipment company. Acquires a "blockchain mining" company for a few mil, stock shoots up overnight like 500% or something, then their CEO dumps all his stocks.
Related: http://www.businessinsider.com/riot-blockchain-citron-resear...
Their net income has been positive for each of the last five quarters and their operations and business produced net cash in the first three quarters of 2017 [1].
Their operations throw off substantially more cash than the $30 or so million in interest they pay each year, and their senior notes don't come due until 2020. Moody's and S&P rate them as highly-speculative, non-investment grade companies (B1) [2]. Not great, but not at risk of imminent default either.
It's not a healthy company. But it's not one in the midst of its death throes, either. Given the amount of dumb money chasing anything that smells like Blockchain, it's not particularly dumb to let shareholders sell their shares at a premium to uninformed buyers.
Book equity is a bad sole measure of the health of a business, particularly a financial business.
[1] https://finance.google.com/finance?q=NASDAQ%3AMGI&fstype=ii&...
[2] https://www.sec.gov/Archives/edgar/data/1273931/000127393117...
Disclaimer: This is not investment advice. Do not buy or sell any securities based on this Internet commentary.
Are you advocating companies exploiting uninformed investors or just saying that it's the "money-smart dickish move"?
I'm not advocating it. I'm saying there is a logic to it.
CryTek was on the verge of bankruptcy a year ago when they were unable to pay their employees. The one-time payment from Amazon in exchange for the engine distribution rights is probably running out.
https://www.reddit.com/r/gamedev/comments/7l640w/crytek_has_...
https://www.reddit.com/r/gamedev/comments/5wzlf2/crytek_empl...
http://www.eurogamer.net/articles/2016-12-20-crytek-breaks-s...
$900 million in debt. Assets minus liabilities is around -$184 million.
That accepts money payments.
This seems like the entire purpose crypto is designed for.
Totally thought Kodak was BS, but I can't deny when money companies are working with money companies.
Of course Uber followed a traditional funding model that restricted access to the top 1% of wealthy Americans. All VC-backed startups do. And many of them follow this curve, it's just not visible to us.
Otherwise I can't see how else they can have loss while all migrant people are using them to send money home.
[1] https://corporate.walmart.com/_news_/news-archive/2014/04/17...
Either way you look at Fiat is going to be around for a few years yet - ripple are actually aiding the transition.