Is Wolfspeed Stock a Buy on the Latest Dip?

Wolfspeed (NYSE: WOLF) had been one of the hottest stocks in the market this spring, surging on hopes that it could become the next AI winner.

The rise coincided with a bullish report from Substack publication Citrini Research, which had earlier come into prominence after publishing a thought piece about how artificial intelligence (AI) would negatively impact software-as-a-service (SaaS) stocks, helping sink that sector.

However, after its shares reached more than $80, Wolfspeed stock has come crashing back down to earth, retracing the big move it had made in May following Citrini pumping the stock. Its latest pullback coincided with another disheartening earnings report on Aug. 19.

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Negative gross margins and weak sales persist

Wolfspeed emerged from bankruptcy last fall, wiping out some expensive debt and finding itself on better footing. However, many of the issues that pushed it into bankruptcy in the first place remain. The chief among them is negative gross margins.

Wolfspeed positioned itself as the leader in silicon carbide (SiC) powered chips. The company constructed expensive manufacturing plants to build out a vertically integrated supply chain. SiC has superior heat-conducting properties compared to typical silicon chips, and thus initially was projected to play a major role in the electric vehicle (EV) market.

However, the company ran into severe execution bottlenecks and market headwinds. The move to larger 200mm wafers proved to be more technically challenging than imagined, while EV demand started to slow. Meanwhile, Tesla decided to greatly reduce its use of SiC moving forward.

That left Wolfspeed with severely underutilized, brand-spanking-new plants, which is one of the worst things a semiconductor company can experience. It is also one of the reasons why most traditional silicon-based chipmakers use a fabless model and rely on third-party foundries like Taiwan Semiconductor Manufacturing.

Wolfspeed's operational issues persisted in its fiscal fourth quarter, with the company seeing negative gross margins of 25% due to continued plant underutilization. Adjusted gross margins, meanwhile, came in at negative 19.9%, a 70-basis point sequential improvement.

Revenue growth continues to be an issue, with revenue falling 24% year over year from $197 million to $149.6 million. It was also a slight sequential decline from $150.2 million in fiscal Q3 and right in the middle of its $140 million to $160 million outlook.

While auto revenue remained soft, the company did see its AI data center revenue more than double year over year and rise 20% sequentially. It highlighted a few new design wins with power supply companies, while saying SiC content was increasing in data centers due to the transition to 800-volt architectures.

Given its negative gross margins and $600 million in net debt, cash flow remains an issue. The company has negative operating cash flow of $180.3 million over the past nine months after exiting bankruptcy, and negative free cash flow of $253.7 million. It will look to retire some high-interest debt to help with its cash flow moving forward.

Looking ahead, the company once again guided for quarterly revenue to be in the $140 million to $160 million range and for gross margins to remain negative. It said it would likely need revenue to reach $800 million in revenue for its adjusted gross margins to break even.

Is the stock a buy on the dip?

Even after coming out of bankruptcy, Wolfspeed still finds itself in a precarious position. Negative gross margins and free cash flow are never great signs for a business, and the company will need to see a meaningful acceleration in sales just to get to breakeven gross margins, which isn't exactly a huge accomplishment.

That said, the transition to 800-volt architectures in AI data centers is a legitimate structural shift, and the opportunity for SiC is both real and accelerating. So, there is the potential for a big turnaround in the stock. This makes Wolfspeed an interesting, but highly speculative, stock to buy at this point.

Geoffrey Seiler has no position in any of the stocks mentioned. The Motley Fool has positions in and recommends Taiwan Semiconductor Manufacturing and Tesla. The Motley Fool recommends Wolfspeed. The Motley Fool has a disclosure policy.