The last three months have been tough on Element 25 Limited (ASX:E25) shareholders, who have seen the share price decline a rather worrying 37%. But over five years returns have been remarkably great. Indeed, the share price is up a whopping 621% in that time. So it might be that some shareholders are taking profits after good performance. Only time will tell if there is still too much optimism currently reflected in the share price. Unfortunately not all shareholders will have held it for the long term, so spare a thought for those caught in the 58% decline over the last twelve months. It really delights us to see such great share price performance for investors.
With that in mind, it's worth seeing if the company's underlying fundamentals have been the driver of long term performance, or if there are some discrepancies.
View our latest analysis for Element 25
Element 25 wasn't profitable in the last twelve months, it is unlikely we'll see a strong correlation between its share price and its earnings per share (EPS). Arguably revenue is our next best option. When a company doesn't make profits, we'd generally expect to see good revenue growth. Some companies are willing to postpone profitability to grow revenue faster, but in that case one does expect good top-line growth.
In the last 5 years Element 25 saw its revenue grow at 95% per year. Even measured against other revenue-focussed companies, that's a good result. Fortunately, the market has not missed this, and has pushed the share price up by 48% per year in that time. It's never too late to start following a top notch stock like Element 25, since some long term winners go on winning for decades. So we'd recommend you take a closer look at this one, but keep in mind the market seems optimistic.
The graphic below depicts how earnings and revenue have changed over time (unveil the exact values by clicking on the image).
We like that insiders have been buying shares in the last twelve months. Even so, future earnings will be far more important to whether current shareholders make money. Before buying or selling a stock, we always recommend a close examination of historic growth trends, available here..
A Different Perspective
While the broader market gained around 14% in the last year, Element 25 shareholders lost 58%. Even the share prices of good stocks drop sometimes, but we want to see improvements in the fundamental metrics of a business, before getting too interested. Longer term investors wouldn't be so upset, since they would have made 48%, each year, over five years. If the fundamental data continues to indicate long term sustainable growth, the current sell-off could be an opportunity worth considering. I find it very interesting to look at share price over the long term as a proxy for business performance. But to truly gain insight, we need to consider other information, too. Like risks, for instance. Every company has them, and we've spotted 4 warning signs for Element 25 (of which 2 make us uncomfortable!) you should know about.