Pandora “The Company Most Likely To Collapse In 2014”, Says Top Analyst

Pandora has been named "The Company Most Likely To Collapse In 2014" by The Street analyst Rocco Pendola. In addition to increased online competition and high royalty obligations, traditional broadcasters are finally waking up and getting innovative. By contrast, he sees Pandora as standing still. "It's acting a lot like traditional radio acted when Pandora was busy disrupting it," says Pendola.

Yesterday, Wall Street appeared to agree, sending Pandora stock down 8.9%.

Pandora stock had already taken a beating over the last 10 days after releasing slower than expected growth predictions. Yesterday, Pandora released new audience metrics for the month of April 2014, and while they showed significant growth, investors bid the stock price down again.

What's the bottom for Pandora?

Pendola thinks its a sale, perhaps to Apple. "Sooner or later somebody's going to come for Pandora," he writes. "So why not Apple?"

New Pandora Audience Metrics For April

Listener hours during the month of April 2014 were 1.70 billion, an increase of 30% from 1.31 billion during the same period last year.

Share of total U.S. radio listening for Pandora in April 2014 was 9.28%, an increase from 7.33% at the same time last year.

Active listeners were 76.0 million at the end of April 2014, an increase of 8% from 70.1 million during the same time period last year.

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