exactEarth has too much uncertainty, says Paradigm Capital

exactEarth (exactEarth Stock Quote, Chart, News: TSX:XCT) has potential, but right now it’s a “show me” stock, says Paradigm Capital analyst Daniel Kim.

Yesterday, exactEarth reported its Q2, 2017 results. The company lost $176,000 on revenue of $3.7-million, a topline that was down per cent from the $5.22-million in revenue the company posted in the same period a year prior.

“Our order book was up again in Q2, led by a large renewal agreement with a key commercial customer and more than 30 new orders,” said CEO Peter Mabson. “We continue to build our sales pipeline in both the government and commercial markets while maintaining a close eye on expenses throughout the organization. The major milestone on our horizon, which we expect will further boost our pipeline opportunities, is achieving real-time global vessel tracking via our second-generation satellite constellation service, exactView RT. exactView RT is a system of more than 60 maritime satellite payloads, being deployed under our strategic agreement with Harris Corp., which is hosted on board the Iridium NEXT satellite constellation. Subsequent to quarter-end, we officially launched the exactView RT service with four satellite payloads now providing global real-time Satellite AIS (automatic identification system) data feeds alongside our first-generation constellation. With additional Iridium NEXT launches scheduled for 2017, the pace with which we are moving towards a continuous real-time vessel tracking capability is expected to accelerate through the remainder of the year.”

Kim says exactEarth’s results were in-line with his expectations. But the analyst says the company’s future rests on exactViewRT, the company’s real-time advanced ship tracking solution, and there is simply not enough information about that yet.

“We believe shares will remain range-bound until we see substantive evidence of what premium customers are willing to pay for real-time S-AIS data,” says the analyst.

In a research update to clients today, Kim maintained his “Hold” rating and one-year price target of $1.35 on exactEarth, implying a return of 3.8 per cent at the time of publication, including dividend.

Kin thinks exactEarth will post Adjusted EBITDA of negative $2.3-million on revenue of $14.4-million in fiscal 2017. He expects those numbers will improve to EBITDA of zero on a topline of $17.7-million the following year.