Teladoc (TDOC 2.39%) is making a serious run at being the most successful coronavirus stock of the pandemic. The telehealth company's shares hit a new all-time high on Friday, before retreating slightly to close a few dollars shy of that level.
The company is the leading provider of remote healthcare services, and those remain a necessity even though many states are starting to reopen their economies and relax their social-distancing mandates. For obvious reasons, most doctors are more cautious about easing up on the measures that were implemented to fight the public health crisis, so services like Teladoc's continue to be much in demand.
Image source: Teladoc.
Teladoc's first-quarter earnings, announced in late April, clearly illustrate this. Revenue rose 41% on a year-over-year basis to nearly $181 million. That well exceeded even the rosiest expectations management set when announcing their guidance (although the outcome wasn't a surprise to the market when it arrives, as the company later announced preliminary results that were close to the final figures).
Encouragingly for its business, Teladoc saw a particularly high jump in total visit fees, which nearly doubled to just under $44 million (the company's revenue consists of subscription fees, still the meat of its business, and visit fees).
Although this hot company's revenues are growing at a torrid pace, investors should be aware that not all is rosy here. Teladoc is still well in the red -- in Q1, its bottom line deficit narrowed -- but not by much -- to $29.6 million. And the company expects to book a net loss both in the current quarter and for the entirety of 2020.
Still, that new record high stock price shows that Teladoc still has a lot of believers. On Friday, even after slipping down from its peak, its shares ended the day up by nearly 5%, in contrast to the broader market, which fell fractionally.
