Cyberattacks are becoming more common and costly, driven by trends like remote work, digital transformation, and the growing number of connected devices. Damages inflicted by cybercrime will total an estimated $8 trillion in 2023, up from $3 trillion in 2015, according to Cybersecurity Ventures, and that figure will almost certainly continue to climb in the future.
CrowdStrike (CRWD +0.01%) is well positioned to benefit from that trend. While its share price has plummeted 67% amid the ongoing bear market, the company has continued to run circles around its competition. It recently became the second-fastest software vendor in history to achieve an annual revenue run rate of $2 billion, and investors have good reason to believe that momentum will continue.
Here's why this extraordinary growth stock is worth buying today.
NASDAQ: CRWD
Key Data Points
The silver lining to the economic storm cloud
In November, CrowdStrike reported solid third-quarter results. Its customer base increased 44%, and existing customers continued to adopt more software modules.
In turn, revenue soared 53% to $581 million, and free cash flow climbed 41% to $174 million. But those results were overshadowed by a gloomy outlook.
Management said sales cycles were lengthening as customers scrutinized budgets and delayed purchases in response to economic headwinds. That trend is expected to continue in the fourth quarter and beyond, meaning revenue growth will almost certainly decelerate in the near term. In fact, management said subscription revenue growth could clock in as low as 30% next year.
That news is certainly not ideal, but there are a few silver linings investors should consider. First, CEO George Kurtz said gross retention rates "remained at record levels above 98%," meaning customers are sticking with CrowdStrike even if they are delaying purchases.
Second, Kurtz also noted that "win rates increased meaningfully" during the quarter, meaning potential customers are choosing CrowdStrike over its rivals more frequently. In other words, the economic downturn may actually be an opportunity for CrowdStrike to gain market share.
Finally, economic headwinds are a temporary problem, and CrowdStrike has a rock-solid competitive position in a large, growing market, meaning the company should have no trouble reaccelerating growth when business spending normalizes.
CrowdStrike is the gold standard in cybersecurity
Industry analysts have recognized CrowdStrike as a leader in several cybersecurity software verticals, including endpoint detection and response, cloud-native application protection, and threat intelligence. Analysts have also recognized the company's leadership in certain cybersecurity service verticals, including managed detection and response, and incident response services.
That success stems from a unique platform architecture, industry-leading artificial intelligence (AI), and a broad product portfolio that allows customers to secure endpoints, cloud workloads, identity, and data from a single user interface. Specifically, CrowdStrike delivers 23 modules through a single software agent that can be installed without a system reboot. That unique quality streamlines deployment for customers, and it alleviates the burden created by other vendors that require multiple installations and system downtime.
CrowdStrike also designed its platform to crowdsource data on an unmatched scale, which makes its AI model uniquely effective in detecting and preventing attacks. Research company Frost & Sullivan highlighted that competitive advantage in a recent report, saying, "CrowdStrike leads the industry with regards to the application of artificial intelligence/machine learning to endpoint security, as well as providing unparalleled prevention of malware and malware-free attacks."
Finally, CrowdStrike has been a force of disruptive innovation from day one. Over a decade ago, the company invented a proactive detection technique called Indicators of Attack (IoA), a fundamentally different approach than the reactive Indicators of Compromise (IoC) used by legacy vendors. IoAs indicate that something bad might happen, whereas IoCs indicate that something bad already did happen. Which information would you rather have?
Building on that, CrowdStrike recently debuted the industry's first AI-powered IoAs, which further advance its ability to stop the most sophisticated threats.
CrowdStrike currently values its addressable market at $76 billion, but management believes its product roadmap could push that figure to $158 billion by 2026, meaning the company is still innovating at a furious pace, and it has hardly scratched the surface of its addressable market.
CrowdStrike's stock has never looked cheaper
Currently, CrowdStrike trades at 11.05 times sales and 37.87 times free cash flow. Those valuations may not look cheap in a traditional sense, but both multiples represent an all-time low, meaning the stock has never been cheaper.
More importantly, 11 times sales seems more than fair for one of the fastest-growing software companies in history, especially when CrowdStrike has so much untapped potential. That's why this growth stock is worth buying today.
