PlaySide Studios Limited (ASX:PLY) shareholders should be happy to see the share price up 14% in the last quarter. But that doesn't change the reality of under-performance over the last twelve months. In fact, the price has declined 39% in a year, falling short of the returns you could get by investing in an index fund.
Since shareholders are down over the longer term, lets look at the underlying fundamentals over the that time and see if they've been consistent with returns.
See our latest analysis for PlaySide Studios
PlaySide Studios 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. As you can imagine, fast revenue growth, when maintained, often leads to fast profit growth.
In the last twelve months, PlaySide Studios increased its revenue by 138%. That's well above most other pre-profit companies. Given the revenue growth, the share price drop of 39% seems quite harsh. Our sympathies to shareholders who are now underwater. On the bright side, if this company is moving profits in the right direction, top-line growth like that could be an opportunity. Our brains have evolved to think in linear fashion, so there's value in learning to recognize exponential growth. We are, in some ways, simply the wisest of the monkeys.
The graphic below depicts how earnings and revenue have changed over time (unveil the exact values by clicking on the image).
You can see how its balance sheet has strengthened (or weakened) over time in this free interactive graphic.
A Different Perspective
While PlaySide Studios shareholders are down 39% for the year, the market itself is up 11%. However, keep in mind that even the best stocks will sometimes underperform the market over a twelve month period. It's great to see a nice little 14% rebound in the last three months. Let's just hope this isn't the widely-feared 'dead cat bounce' (which would indicate further declines to come). If you would like to research PlaySide Studios in more detail then you might want to take a look at whether insiders have been buying or selling shares in the company.
If you are like me, then you will not want to miss this free list of growing companies that insiders are buying.
Please note, the market returns quoted in this article reflect the market weighted average returns of stocks that currently trade on Australian exchanges.