Rostock Ventures Corp (OTCMKTS:ROSV) Hits a Hype-Induced 52-Week High
Is there anything in common between the bitcoin business and the medical marijuana industry? Generally speaking, there’s absolutely nothing connecting the two sectors, but they are among the hottest topics in Pennyland at the moment. Rostock Ventures Corp (OTCMKTS:ROSV) know this and they are taking full advantage of it.
After years as a mineral exploration company and many failed attempts to commence operations, they decided to change tactics and, on December 11, they announced that they are investigating opportunities in the bitcoin industry. A month later they issued another press release saying that they’re still looking at the options of dealing with the hot virtual currency and, since they had nothing else to tell us, they promised to update us on new developments in the future. The announcements did cause some stir, but the volumes remained negligible while the performance suffered from lack of consistency.
Another press release hit the wire on Friday and it promises to change all that. Apparently, ROSV are now looking at the opportunities of entering yet another hot industry – the medical marijuana business. The press release itself is somewhat sparse on details, but apparently, the company’s new business plan will be centered around a mobile platform that somehow ties the sales of medical cannabis with a new type of social network.
The mention of the word “marijuana” was enough to cause a lot of stir among investors. Friday’s session ended with a new 52-week high of $0.053, price gains of 42%, and a dollar volume of around $456 thousand. When the closing bell rang, ROSV was standing at exactly $0.05 per share which commands a market cap of just over $2 million.
That may not sound like much, but once you take a quick look into the company’s latest financial statement, you’ll see that it could be a bit of a stretch. Here’s a summary of the most important figures as of September 30:
- total assets: $8,500 in cash
- total liabilities: $296 thousand
- no revenue since inception
- quarterly net loss: $1,265
The $2 million market cap might also be a bit too much for a company that, according to its latest 10-K, has only one employee and uses “a portion of our Chief Executive Officer’s home as our corporate headquarters“.
Speaking of the CEO, his name is Gregory Rotelli and, as we mentioned in some of our previous articles on ROSV, he was also at the helm of Razor Resources Inc (OTCMKTS:RZOR). He no longer holds that position, but he is listed as the Chief Executive Officer of Independence Energy Corp (OTCBB:IDNG) -a double-zero penny stock with very little in terms of assets, no revenues, and a devastating performance under the pressure of paid pumps.
Take a look at the older filings, and you’ll see that prior to Mr. Rotelli’s arrival in 2011, ROSV was steered by a person called Luis Carrillo. If you haven’t heard that name before, we would suggest you take a look through this press release issued by the SEC in March 2013.
You can see that there’s no shortage of red flags around ROSV. The bitcoin/medical marijuana hype is keeping the stock afloat at the moment, but sooner or later, the enthusiasm will die down and an eventual drop seems all but inevitable. Doing a lot of due diligence and carefully considering all the risks is, as always, absolutely essential.
