Although Lightspeed’s revenue is rising, the Montreal-based company still posted an $814 million loss in the third quarter due to the decline in its shares and the depreciation of its recent acquisitions.
• Also read: Lightspeed is laying off 300 employees
That loss is more than 10 times greater than analysts’ expectations, which had forecast it at $73 million.
The inventory management and sales specialist, both online and in-store, therefore continues to lose money.
The technology sector is having a bad time in the stock market, where investor appetites have been weakening for several months.
A wave of layoffs has also gripped giants like Shopify, Alphabet (Google), Amazon, and Microsoft, as well as Lightspeed, which laid off 300 employees, or 10% of its workforce, last month.
“Changing staff is never an easy decision, but it was a necessary decision that strengthens our foundations for future growth,” CEO Jean-Paul Chauvet said during a conference call with analysts on Thursday.
Despite that loss of more than CA$1 billion, Lightspeed is sticking to one of its flagship guidance: It will be profitable in fiscal 2024, at least in terms of earnings before interest, taxes, depreciation and amortization (EBITDA).
EBITDA ended the third quarter with a loss of $5.4 million while revenue hit $188.7 million. They were $152.7 million in the same period last year.
As of 11:40 a.m. Thursday on the Toronto Stock Exchange, Lightspeed shares are down 7.56% to $23.00.
a darling
Lightspeed is one of the darlings of Quebec’s financial community.
Last July, when the company’s stock was listed, the Commerce Department secretly bought shares from Pierre Fitzgibbon for $49 million.
This push from Quebec comes on top of about $200 million in public funding that has flowed into the company in recent years.
Notably, Caisse de dépôt and Investissement Québec together invested more than $40 million in Lightspeed in 2015, then Caisse invested another $170 million in 2017, making it the company’s largest shareholder with more than 14%.