By buying an index fund, you can roughly match the market return with ease. But if you pick the right individual stocks, you could make more than that. For example, the Ronglian Group Ltd. (SZSE:002642) share price is up 63% in the last three years, clearly besting the market decline of around 20% (not including dividends).

Since it's been a strong week for Ronglian Group shareholders, let's have a look at trend of the longer term fundamentals.

Given that Ronglian Group 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 hope to see good 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 the last 3 years Ronglian Group saw its revenue shrink by 18% per year. The revenue growth might be lacking but the share price has gained 18% each year in that time. If the company is cutting costs profitability could be on the horizon, but the revenue decline is a prima facie concern.

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

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

A Different Perspective

Ronglian Group shareholders are down 12% for the year, but the market itself is up 4.9%. Even the share prices of good stocks drop sometimes, but we want to see improvements in the fundamental metrics of a business, before getting too interested. On the bright side, long term shareholders have made money, with a gain of 6% per year over half a decade. If the fundamental data continues to indicate long term sustainable growth, the current sell-off could be an opportunity worth considering. Shareholders might want to examine this detailed historical graph of past earnings, revenue and cash flow.

If you like to buy stocks alongside management, then you might just love this free list of companies. (Hint: many of them are unnoticed AND have attractive valuation).

Please note, the market returns quoted in this article reflect the market weighted average returns of stocks that currently trade on Chinese 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.