Another CFO Sneaks Out The Door (ACPW)

Active Power, Inc. (NASDAQ: ACPW) is in the business of manufacturing and designing continuous power and infrastructure solutions.  It has been a highly troubled stock and now it is announcing something that investors usually hate to see: the resignation of its chief financial officer and vice president of Finance.

CFO John Penver will continue to serve as an interim CFO through October 31, 2012 while the company searches for a new CFO.  The good news about staying on for several months should be obvious that this CFO resignation may not be a death-watch resignation. If a CFO leaves a company immediately and without any stay-on period it spooks investors into thinking that things are about to go from bad to worse.

Calling this the ‘growth’ story is a misnomer here for investors as this has been public for just over a decade and this was initially worth $50 per share from the start.  Outside of the share price, revenues have grown: $75.482 million in 2011; $64.955 million in 2010; and $40.311 million in 2009. Unfortunately it has lost money the whole way.

At $0.86 per share, the 52-week range is $0.59 to $2.67. The company has only about $19.4 million in cash of its March 31 balance sheet and its market cap is $81.8 million.

JON C. OGG