I’m all for rebound stories and I love rooting for the underdog. But I also know that the underdog is the underdog for a reason. Most of the time, Goliath tops David without getting scratched.

When I hear investors chattering about a potential rebound in beaten-up streaming music platform Pandora Media Inc (NYSE:P), I get excited — at first. Could the leader-turned-underdog actually make a comeback? If so, P stock could fly! After all, it’s done nothing but fall from $40 to $5 over the past five years.

But then I back up, and look at everything from the fundamentals to the financials to what music platforms all my friends are using. I quickly lose all hope for a rebound in P stock.

The harsh reality is that Pandora is yesterday’s favorite music streaming platform, and with Apple Music and Spotify only gaining momentum and margins at Pandora still coming down, there is very little hope for Pandora to be anything but yesterday’s favorite music streaming platform.

All in all, P stock is a must-avoid. Even at all-time lows.

No Hope For P Stock

Not too long ago, Pandora pioneered this era of music streaming. But it pioneered the era of radio music streaming — meaning you couldn’t play a song on demand. Then competitors like Spotify and Apple Music came along, and offered on-demand music streaming for a subscription fee — meaning you could play any song at any time. Pandora refused to jump on the bandwagon.

Bad move. As it turns out, on-demand is exactly what people want and what they will pay for. Think Netflix, Inc. (NASDAQ:NFLX). In this whole streaming content world, consumers want to pick exactly what content they want to consume, and they are willing to pay for that on-demand convenience. Consequently, Spotify and Apple Music soared. Their user bases swelled, and they became the faces of the booming streaming music industry.

As for Pandora? It was left behind. It has since launched a subscription tier to match Spotify and Apple Music, but it’s just too little, too late. Spotify and Apple Music have established themselves as the go-to, on-demand music streaming platforms. Pandora has failed to break into that discussion.

Just look at the numbers.

Spotify has over 70 million subscribers. Apple Music has 36 million subs. Pandora? It only has 5 million subs. Moreover, despite Pandora’s small size, it isn’t growing that quickly. Apple Music is growing its sub base by roughly 15% per quarter, while Spotify is growing at 6% per quarter.

Pandora grew its sub base by 7% last quarter, in-line with Spotify’s growth rate — but Spotify’s sub base is 14-times as big. And even though Pandora’s sub base is growing, its active user base has gone from 80 million two years ago to 74 million today. Total listener hours fell 5% year-over-year last quarter.

All these numbers line up with what I am seeing among friends and family. No one I know uses Pandora anymore. Most people have Spotify. Some have Apple Music. A lot use YouTube or SoundCloud.

Without user growth, the only hope for P stock is that this company magically waves a wand and turns a profit with its current sub base.

But that isn’t going to happen any time soon.

The U.S. Copyright Royalty Board just awarded songwriters their biggest pay raise in history by bumping up the royalty rates owed by music streaming platforms to content creators from 10.5% to 15.1%. That means companies like Pandora are going to have higher content costs. A lot higher content costs. We are talking a near 500 basis point jump.

That is catastrophic for P stock. Pandora already runs sizable losses, and hasn’t shown consistent profitability or generated positive cash flows in two years. Margins are already under pressure (gross margins fell 300 basis points last quarter), thanks to higher content costs. Those content costs are about to swell over the next five years, meaning margins will be under further pressure.

That’s no good. It means profitability is nearly impossible unless the user base grows dramatically. And that isn’t happening. Nor will it happen any time soon.

Bottom Line on P Stock

Pandora is yesterday’s favorite music streaming platform. Given current dynamics in the music streaming industry, Pandora will remain just that into the foreseeable future.

Meanwhile, margins are falling and will keep falling, thanks to higher content costs.

Is there rebound potential for P stock? I highly doubt it. Squeezing margins and falling popularity aren’t a recipe for David to beat Goliath.

As of this writing, Luke Lango was long NFLX.