Quarterlies: Today's bunch wasn't that tasty, but there were some exceptions

There are few better times of the year in ASX land to sort the wheat from the chaff than quarterly season. Most of today’s 4Cs left investors disappointed, but a couple were welcomed.

The winners

Marley Spoon (ASX:MMM) +12%

It was another strong quarter for the food ingredient delivery company. In the 2019 calendar year it raised €129.6m ($211.3m) in revenue — up 41 per cent year on year. Twenty two million meals were delivered worldwide.

Marley Spoon also shone in Australia as well, with quarterly and yearly revenues up 50 per cent from the prior corresponding periods. It also said its Woolworths partnership was progressing well.

While it still made a quarterly earnings loss for the quarter of €2.4m, this was far lower than the €8.6m it lost in Q4 2018. The company forecasts it will be operating earnings positive by the end of 2020.

Jatenergy (ASX:JAT) +4%

This company has been in many industries during its listed life, calling itself this morning an Australia-Asia trade specialist. Jatenergy had its third straight positive cash flow quarter, generating $700,000 in net cash from operations. Cash receipts totalled $20.7m.

During the quarter it became the third ASX stock to enter the plant-based meat sector. It expects to ship the first batch of products to China next month. Also this quarter it will be the only company to have an end-to-end dairy business in China, having opened its own retail stores and a facility.

The losers

BlueChiip (ASX:BCT) -14%

The tracking tech stock is still far higher than a year ago when it was 7c, but after hitting as high as 18c last year, it dropped to 12c today.

Revenue and chip deliveries were less than the company predicted and it blamed shipping and customs delays. But the company said it had over 1.5 million chips in process and anticipated a ramp up this quarter.

Yowie (ASX:YOW) -7%

By the company’s admission, it was a tough quarter due to soft sales.

The chocolatier, which spent much of last year fighting a takeover bid, booked an earnings loss of $US955,000 ($1.4m). It also expects operating cash flow to stay negative for the next couple of quarters.

Nearmap (ASX:NEA) -25%

While not a quarterly per-se, the aerial mapping firm fell after a disappointing market update. It cut its annual contract value guidance from $116-$120m to $102-$110m.

This was despite seeing 23 per cent growth last quarter compared to the December 2018 quarter. The company blamed a couple of specific deals being churned or downgraded, but said because it won more clients the impact of one or two hitting its bottom line would be reduced.

1st Group (ASX:1ST) -6%

The health appointment booking platform had a positive quarter overall with all key performance indicators growing. But growth was slower than the quarter before.

For instance, after adding $450,000 in annual contract value in the September quarter it added only $186,000 in the December quarter. The company said many landmark deals secured last year would begin to have an impact this financial year.