When you buy shares in a company, it's worth keeping in mind the possibility that it could fail, and you could lose your money. But on a lighter note, a good company can see its share price rise well over 100%. One great example is MongoDB, Inc. (NASDAQ:MDB) which saw its share price drive 131% higher over five years. Also pleasing for shareholders was the 23% gain in the last three months. This could be related to the recent financial results, released recently - you can catch up on the most recent data by reading our company report.

While this past week has detracted from the company's five-year return, let's look at the recent trends of the underlying business and see if the gains have been in alignment.

MongoDB isn't currently profitable, so most analysts would look to revenue growth to get an idea of how fast the underlying business is growing. Generally speaking, companies without profits are expected to grow revenue every year, and at a good clip. That's because fast revenue growth can be easily extrapolated to forecast profits, often of considerable size.

For the last half decade, MongoDB can boast revenue growth at a rate of 32% per year. Even measured against other revenue-focussed companies, that's a good result. Meanwhile, its share price performance certainly reflects the strong growth, given the share price grew at 18% per year, compound, during the period. So it seems likely that buyers have paid attention to the strong revenue growth. MongoDB seems like a high growth stock - so growth investors might want to add it to their watchlist.

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

MongoDB is well known by investors, and plenty of clever analysts have tried to predict the future profit levels. So it makes a lot of sense to check out what analysts think MongoDB will earn in the future (free analyst consensus estimates)

A Different Perspective

Investors in MongoDB had a tough year, with a total loss of 16%, against a market gain of about 32%. However, keep in mind that even the best stocks will sometimes underperform the market over a twelve month period. Longer term investors wouldn't be so upset, since they would have made 18%, 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. It's always interesting to track share price performance over the longer term. But to understand MongoDB better, we need to consider many other factors. For instance, we've identified 3 warning signs for MongoDB that you should be aware of.

We will like MongoDB better if we see some big insider buys. While we wait, check out this free list of undervalued stocks (mostly small caps) 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 American 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.