Every investor on earth makes bad calls sometimes. But you have a problem if you face massive losses more than once in a while. So take a moment to sympathize with the long term shareholders of Travere Therapeutics, Inc. (NASDAQ:TVTX), who have seen the share price tank a massive 72% over a three year period. That might cause some serious doubts about the merits of the initial decision to buy the stock, to put it mildly. The more recent news is of little comfort, with the share price down 65% in a year. And the share price decline continued over the last week, dropping some 14%.

Since Travere Therapeutics has shed US$90m from its value in the past 7 days, let's see if the longer term decline has been driven by the business' economics.

Given that Travere Therapeutics didn't make a profit in the last twelve months, we'll focus on revenue growth to form a quick view of its business development. When a company doesn't make profits, we'd generally expect to see good revenue growth. That's because fast revenue growth can be easily extrapolated to forecast profits, often of considerable size.

Over the last three years, Travere Therapeutics' revenue dropped 2.5% per year. That is not a good result. The share price fall of 20% (per year, over three years) is a stern reminder that money-losing companies are expected to grow revenue. We're generally averse to companies with declining revenues, but we're not alone in that. There's no more than a snowball's chance in hell that share price will head back to its old highs, in the short term.

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

Travere Therapeutics is a well known stock, with plenty of analyst coverage, suggesting some visibility into future growth. You can see what analysts are predicting for Travere Therapeutics in this interactive graph of future profit estimates.

A Different Perspective

Travere Therapeutics shareholders are down 65% for the year, but the market itself is up 31%. However, keep in mind that even the best stocks will sometimes underperform the market over a twelve month period. Unfortunately, last year's performance may indicate unresolved challenges, given that it was worse than the annualised loss of 11% over the last half decade. We realise that Baron Rothschild has said investors should "buy when there is blood on the streets", but we caution that investors should first be sure they are buying a high quality business. 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. Even so, be aware that Travere Therapeutics is showing 4 warning signs in our investment analysis , you should know about...

Of course, you might find a fantastic investment by looking elsewhere. So take a peek at this free list of companies we expect will grow earnings.

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.