Aside from vTv Therapeutics (NASDAQ:VTVT) getting a huge bounce after being straight up pummeled last week following news of the failure of their experimental Alzheimer's drug, the best performing NASDAQ-listed stock on Wednesday is IZEA, Inc. (NASDAQ:IZEA).
The operator of IZEAx, an online marketplace connecting influential content creators with brands and publishers, is churning out a big gain after releasing its results from the fourth quarter and full year ended December 31, 2017.
For the quarter, revenue rose 16% to $6.8 million from $5.9 million in Q4 2016. Revenue from managed services, which accounts fro the lion's share of sales, was up from $5.7 million to $6.6 million.
Content workflow revenue slipped from $116,000 to $77,000. Gross billings rose to $7.8 million from $7.4 million. Total costs and expenses were cut from $7.7 million to $7.5 million, helping net loss be slashed from $1.8 million in Q4 2016 to $743,000 in Q4 2017.
Adjusted earnings before interest, taxes, depreciation and amortization (EBITDA), which excludes one-time items, was $103,000 versus a loss of $1.1 million a year earlier.
It was the company's first positive EBITDA quarter, which CEO Ted Murphy said came a full year ahead of schedule.
For all of 2017, revenue rose 15% to a record $24.4 million, up from $21.2 million in 2016. Revenue from managed services gained 17% to $23.8 million. Revenue from custom content was particularly strong, growing 47%, or $1.7 million, from 2016.
Content workflow sales were down 25% at $351,000. Gross billings improved 7% to an all-time best at $29.2 million. Net loss rang in at $5.5 million, an improvement of $2.1 million from a net loss of $7.6 million in the year prior. Adjusted EBITDA was still in the red at $2.5 million, but better than the loss of $5.1 million in 2016.
Investors are cheering the report, sending shares of IZEA up 38.3% to $3.04 with about an hour left in the trading session. Somewhat akin to the beatdown VTVT took lately, shares of IZEA fell off a cliff at the end of March from over $4.00 to a low of $1.81 last Thursday.
Earlier in today's trading shares peaked as high as $3.98 to recover all the lost ground, but have given some back as the day has worn on.
