How Can InterCloud’s Gains be Rationalized?

The shares slid further to a post-IPO low of $2.20 and closed at $2.55 before InterCloud announced its third quarter results after the markets closed Thursday night. The numbers were unexpectedly huge and the shares are up about 250% on Friday.

Revenue was up more than 400% year-over-year and earnings per share rose from a loss of $2.16 in the third quarter of 2012 to $0.12 this year. Gross profit rose more than 400% as well.

So what gives? The company was incorporated in 1999 and has only expanded rapidly since 2010 when it merged with a company called Digital Comm Inc. The company’s stock price in March was $3.35 a share following a 1-for-125 reverse stock split effected in January. Another 1-for-4 reverse split was held in August, raising the share price from around $2.70 to $11.00. Since then, shares have trailed off to last night’s $2.55 close.

Investors must have believed this morning that they are looking at an $11 stock priced at an unbelievably low price. Maybe that’s true and maybe it isn’t, but it’s certainly too soon to make the call.

Shares of InterCloud are trading at $9.91, up nearly 290% from Thursday’s closing price of $2.55. The stock’s 52-week range is $2.20 to $36.00. The high end of that range must have come when the company was still known as Genesis Group Holdings Inc.