If You Had Bought Altimmune (NASDAQ:ALT) Stock A Year Ago, You'd Be Sitting On A 48% Loss, Today
It's easy to match the overall market return by buying an index fund. While individual stocks can be big winners, plenty more fail to generate satisfactory returns. That downside risk was realized by Altimmune, Inc. (NASDAQ:ALT) shareholders over the last year, as the share price declined 48%. That falls noticeably short of the market return of around 13%. Altimmune hasn't been listed for long, so although we're wary of recent listings that perform poorly, it may still prove itself with time. The falls have accelerated recently, with the share price down 13% in the last three months.
Check out our latest analysis for Altimmune
Altimmune isn't a profitable company, so 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. Shareholders of unprofitable companies usually expect strong revenue growth. That's because it's hard to be confident a company will be sustainable if revenue growth is negligible, and it never makes a profit.
In just one year Altimmune saw its revenue fall by 22%. That's not what investors generally want to see. Shareholders have seen the share price drop 48% in that time. That seems pretty reasonable given the lack of both profits and revenue growth. We think most holders must believe revenue growth will improve, or else costs will decline.
The image below shows how earnings and revenue have tracked over time (if you click on the image you can see greater detail).
This free interactive report on Altimmune's balance sheet strength is a great place to start, if you want to investigate the stock further.
A Different Perspective
Given that the market gained 13% in the last year, Altimmune shareholders might be miffed that they lost 48%. While the aim is to do better than that, it's worth recalling that even great long-term investments sometimes underperform for a year or more. The share price decline has continued throughout the most recent three months, down 13%, 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. Before spending more time on Altimmune it might be wise to click here to see if insiders have been buying or selling shares.
We will like Altimmune better if we see some big insider buys. While we wait, check out this free list of growing companies with considerable, recent, insider buying.
Please note, the market returns quoted in this article reflect the market weighted average returns of stocks that currently trade on US exchanges.
We aim to bring you long-term focused research analysis driven by fundamental data. Note that our analysis may not factor in the latest price-sensitive company announcements or qualitative material.
If you spot an error that warrants correction, please contact the editor at editorial-team@simplywallst.com. This article by Simply Wall St is general in nature. It does not constitute a recommendation to buy or sell any stock, and does not take account of your objectives, or your financial situation. Simply Wall St has no position in the stocks mentioned. Thank you for reading.
