Yesterday's decline means that the S&P/ASX 200 (Index: ^AXJO) (ASX: XJO) has now fallen over 4.2% since this time last year excluding dividends. While this is disappointing, not all shares on the index have been dragged lower.
The three shares listed below have been the best performers on the index during the period. Here's why:
The Afterpay Touch Group Ltd (ASX: APT) share price may have been hammered during the last few weeks, but it is still up an incredible 105% over the last 12 months. Investors have been very impressed at the way the company's Afterpay platform has captured a growing slice of Australian retail sales this year. Furthermore, its positive start in the U.S. market and plans to enter the U.K. market have excited investors. A recent tech selloff and a Senate inquiry into areas missed by the Royal Commission have weighed on investor sentiment recently, but I remain confident that over the long term Afterpay Touch has enormous global potential.
The Appen Ltd (ASX: APX) share price has been the second-best performer on the ASX 200 over the last 12 months with a 138% gain. The global leader in the development of high-quality, human annotated datasets for machine learning and artificial intelligence has caught the eye of investors with some impressive earnings growth. Just last week the company upgraded its guidance due to stronger than expected demand. It now expects EBITDA for the 12 months ending December 31 to be in the range of $62 million to $65 million, which will be a 120% to 131% increase on FY 2017's result.
The Bravura Solutions Ltd (ASX: BVS) share price has been the best performer on the index over the period with a stunning 152% gain. Investors have been impressed with the performance of the provider of software solutions for the wealth management, life insurance, and funds administration industries over the last 12 months and it isn't hard to see why. In FY 2018 Bravura Solutions delivered a 15% increase in revenue to $221.5 million and a 27% increase in underlying net profit after tax to $27 million. A key driver of this growth was its Sonata platform which underpinned the strong performance of its Wealth Management segment. Pleasingly, given the long runway for growth that the Sonata product has, I think the company is capable of further strong growth in FY 2019.
