Financial Review: Cesca Therapeutics (KOOL) and Syndax Pharmaceuticals (SNDX)

Cesca Therapeutics (NASDAQ: KOOL) and Syndax Pharmaceuticals (NASDAQ:SNDX) are both small-cap medical companies, but which is the better investment? We will compare the two businesses based on the strength of their dividends, risk, analyst recommendations, profitabiliy, institutional ownership, valuation and earnings.

Analyst Ratings

This is a breakdown of current ratings and target prices for Cesca Therapeutics and Syndax Pharmaceuticals, as provided by MarketBeat.com.

	Sell Ratings	Hold Ratings	Buy Ratings	Strong Buy Ratings	Rating Score
Cesca Therapeutics	0	1	0	0	2.00
Syndax Pharmaceuticals	0	0	10	0	3.00

Syndax Pharmaceuticals has a consensus target price of $26.00, indicating a potential upside of 103.44%. Given Syndax Pharmaceuticals’ stronger consensus rating and higher possible upside, analysts clearly believe Syndax Pharmaceuticals is more favorable than Cesca Therapeutics.

Earnings and Valuation

This table compares Cesca Therapeutics and Syndax Pharmaceuticals’ top-line revenue, earnings per share and valuation.

	Gross Revenue	Price/Sales Ratio	EBITDA	Earnings Per Share	Price/Earnings Ratio
Cesca Therapeutics	$14.00 million	2.72	-$6.73 million	($5.28)	-0.73
Syndax Pharmaceuticals	$1.22 million	230.41	-$48.05 million	($2.61)	-4.90

Cesca Therapeutics has higher revenue and earnings than Syndax Pharmaceuticals. Syndax Pharmaceuticals is trading at a lower price-to-earnings ratio than Cesca Therapeutics, indicating that it is currently the more affordable of the two stocks.

Volatility and Risk

Cesca Therapeutics has a beta of -0.72, suggesting that its stock price is 172% less volatile than the S&P 500. Comparatively, Syndax Pharmaceuticals has a beta of 5.15, suggesting that its stock price is 415% more volatile than the S&P 500.

Profitability

This table compares Cesca Therapeutics and Syndax Pharmaceuticals’ net margins, return on equity and return on assets.

	Net Margins	Return on Equity	Return on Assets
Cesca Therapeutics	-225.90%	-33.56%	-23.23%
Syndax Pharmaceuticals	-3,861.72%	-52.82%	-41.67%

Insider & Institutional Ownership

2.4% of Cesca Therapeutics shares are owned by institutional investors. Comparatively, 53.6% of Syndax Pharmaceuticals shares are owned by institutional investors. 3.9% of Cesca Therapeutics shares are owned by insiders. Comparatively, 24.1% of Syndax Pharmaceuticals shares are owned by insiders. Strong institutional ownership is an indication that large money managers, hedge funds and endowments believe a company will outperform the market over the long term.

Summary

Syndax Pharmaceuticals beats Cesca Therapeutics on 8 of the 13 factors compared between the two stocks.

About Cesca Therapeutics

Cesca Therapeutics Inc. is clinical-stage biotechnology company. The Company develops and markets integrated cellular therapies and delivery systems. The Company is engaged in developing and manufacturing of automated blood and bone marrow processing systems that enable the separation, processing and preservation of cell and tissue therapy products. The Company focuses on the business of research, development and commercialization of autologous cell-based therapeutics for use in the regenerative medicine industry. The Company’s therapeutic development initiatives focuses on the fields of cardiovascular medicine and orthopedic regeneration. The Company offers a range of products, such as SurgWerks System, CellWerks System, AutoXpress System (AXP), MarrowXpress System (MXP), BioArchive System, and manual bag sets for use in the processing and cryogenic storage of cord blood.

About Syndax Pharmaceuticals

Syndax Pharmaceuticals, Inc (Syndax) is a clinical stage biopharmaceutical company focused on developing a pipeline of combination therapies in multiple cancer indications. The Company’s product candidate, entinostat, which was granted Breakthrough Therapy designation by the FDA following positive results from its Phase IIb clinical trial, ENCORE 301, is being evaluated in a Phase III clinical trial for advanced hormone receptor positive breast cancer. It is developing entinostat, which has direct effects on both cancer cells and immune regulatory cells, and SNDX-6352, an anti-CSF-1R monoclonal antibody, to enhance the body’s immune response on tumors that have shown sensitivity to immunotherapy. Entinostat is being evaluated as a combination therapeutic in Phase Ib/II clinical trials with Merck & Co., Inc. for non-small cell lung cancer and melanoma, with Genentech, Inc. for TNBC, and with Pfizer Inc. and Merck KGaA, Darmstadt, Germany, for ovarian cancer.