Long term investing is the way to go, but that doesn't mean you should hold every stock forever. We don't wish catastrophic capital loss on anyone. Imagine if you held MeiraGTx Holdings plc (NASDAQ:MGTX) for half a decade as the share price tanked 86%. We also note that the stock has performed poorly over the last year, with the share price down 39%. Shareholders have had an even rougher run lately, with the share price down 31% in the last 90 days. While a drop like that is definitely a body blow, money isn't as important as health and happiness.

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.

Check out our latest analysis for MeiraGTx Holdings

MeiraGTx Holdings 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 hope to see good revenue growth. That's because fast revenue growth can be easily extrapolated to forecast profits, often of considerable size.

In the last half decade, MeiraGTx Holdings saw its revenue increase by 11% per year. That's a fairly respectable growth rate. So the stock price fall of 13% per year seems pretty steep. The truth is that the growth might be below expectations, and investors are probably worried about the continual losses.

The image below shows how earnings and revenue have tracked over time (if you click on the image you can see greater detail).

You can see how its balance sheet has strengthened (or weakened) over time in this free interactive graphic.

A Different Perspective

Investors in MeiraGTx Holdings had a tough year, with a total loss of 39%, against a market gain of about 25%. However, keep in mind that even the best stocks will sometimes underperform the market over a twelve month period. Regrettably, last year's performance caps off a bad run, with the shareholders facing a total loss of 13% per year over five years. Generally speaking long term share price weakness can be a bad sign, though contrarian investors might want to research the stock in hope of a turnaround. While it is well worth considering the different impacts that market conditions can have on the share price, there are other factors that are even more important. Case in point: We've spotted 2 warning signs for MeiraGTx Holdings you should be aware of, and 1 of them doesn't sit too well with us.