Shares in upcoming tech hopeful Reffind Ltd (ASX: RFN) faced an influx of highly motivated sellers this morning, which sent shares plunging – down 10% at the time of writing.
A non-market sensitive announcement was likely the cause, with Reffind this morning announcing it had launched Reffind's 'Educate' product – to go along with its 'Employ' and 'Embrace' enterprise apps.
The Educate product is designed to allow companies to distribute short-form video information to employees via their smartphones, allowing some training or refresher content to be delivered remotely, rather than in expensive and time consuming seminars.
Reffind partnered with Burger Project, a nascent burger restaurant that currently has two outlets, and is aiming to have 50 within the next few years. I believe this is the key to shareholder disappointment today.
Over the past 10 days, CEO Jamie Pride's Twitter account has been dropping hints about a 'secret project' to be announced on March 30. Announcements included pictures of burgers and smartphones. In between these hints was an announcement that the company was looking for '3 Enterprise Account Executives in North America – West Coast' which may have given the market the wrong impression of the upcoming March 30 announcement.
A number of online stock forums had discussions about the upcoming market announcement, with some believing it indicated Reffind would be announcing a new partnership with a major US burger joint, such as Hungry Jacks/Burger King, or Shake Shack.
It's likely that the announcement of a financially immaterial deal disappointed speculators – although Mr Pride would likely have been unable to hint at the deal on Twitter if it was market-sensitive information.
I don't see anything particularly untoward in today's fall, and don't believe that Reffind's prospects have been materially changed by the announcement – or lack of expected major announcement. If anything, the Educate product appears to be a great way to target companies looking to reduce training expenses, in the same way that Employ and Embrace aim to reduce HR expenses and lift employee engagement.
Investors looking to pounce on the price drop should first consider that Reffind is a high risk and loss-making business. Today's fall could also serve as a reminder that unprofitable tech stocks are vulnerable to price volatility and speculation, where shifts in the price don't always reflect changes in the value of the business itself.
