The Afterpay (ASX: APT) share price has suffered a 72%(!) decline from its all-time high of $40.50 just over a month ago on 19 February 2020.
Quite the painful drop. Owen has already looked at a few of the reasons why the Afterpay share price may have plunged so dramatically.
It’s obvious that COVID-19 has changed the landscape for almost every business on the ASX, or any global business.
Seeing the number of infections and deaths rise day after day could be enough to cause a bit of uncertainty. But it’s the economic side of things that appear to have investors particularly fearful.
Are a lot of Afterpay’s prime customers about to lose their jobs, if they haven’t already? Is its current receivables book a lot more risky than it was a couple of months ago? How will the business perform when it already wasn’t profitable? Is in-store underlying sales about to vanish and total underlying sales about to experience a significant decline?
There’s a lot to consider. There’s a chance that Afterpay’s shares could recover strongly next month or by the end of the year.
However, it hasn’t just been one day of heavy selling. Almost the entire last month of activity hasn’t seen much interest from the market. How much is a business worth if it doesn’t make a profit? The year that we could see Afterpay make a profit has been pushed out. Afterpay’s balance sheet is in pretty good shape now, but investors will need to keep an eye on any rise in transaction losses.
Afterpay may not be the best idea to be looking at during the COVID-19 pandemic due to the above risks. It may be wise to wait to see how this plays out over the next few months first before buying. The below tech shares could be better long term bets.
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Disclosure: at the time of publishing, Jaz does not have a financial interest in any of the companies mentioned.
