The past year for Gelion (LON:GELN) investors has not been profitable

The art and science of stock market investing requires a tolerance for losing money on some of the shares you buy. But it's not unreasonable to try to avoid truly shocking capital losses. So spare a thought for the long term shareholders of Gelion plc (LON:GELN); the share price is down a whopping 71% in the last twelve months. That'd be a striking reminder about the importance of diversification. Because Gelion hasn't been listed for many years, the market is still learning about how the business performs. The falls have accelerated recently, with the share price down 34% in the last three months.

Now let's have a look at the company's fundamentals, and see if the long term shareholder return has matched the performance of the underlying business.

View our latest analysis for Gelion

Gelion 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 year Gelion saw its revenue grow by 396%. That's well above most other pre-profit companies. So the hefty 71% share price crash makes us think the company has somehow offended market participants. There's clearly something unusual going on here such as an acquisition that hasn't delivered expected profits. What is clear is that the market is not judging the company on its revenue growth right now. Of course, markets do over-react so share price drop may be too harsh.

The company's revenue and earnings (over time) are depicted in the image below (click to see the exact numbers).

This free interactive report on Gelion's balance sheet strength is a great place to start, if you want to investigate the stock further.

A Different Perspective

We doubt Gelion shareholders are happy with the loss of 71% over twelve months. That falls short of the market, which lost 5.2%. That's disappointing, but it's worth keeping in mind that the market-wide selling wouldn't have helped. The share price decline has continued throughout the most recent three months, down 34%, suggesting an absence of enthusiasm from investors. Given the relatively short history of this stock, we'd remain pretty wary until we see some strong business performance. It's always interesting to track share price performance over the longer term. But to understand Gelion better, we need to consider many other factors. Case in point: We've spotted 2 warning signs for Gelion you should be aware of.

For those who like to find winning investments this free list of growing companies with recent insider purchasing, could be just the ticket.

Please note, the market returns quoted in this article reflect the market weighted average returns of stocks that currently trade on GB exchanges.

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This article by Simply Wall St is general in nature. We provide commentary based on historical data and analyst forecasts only using an unbiased methodology and our articles are not intended to be financial advice. It does not constitute a recommendation to buy or sell any stock, and does not take account of your objectives, or your financial situation. We aim to bring you long-term focused analysis driven by fundamental data. Note that our analysis may not factor in the latest price-sensitive company announcements or qualitative material. Simply Wall St has no position in any stocks mentioned.

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