But apart from both having made it above 100p, the two share price trajectories over the past five years could hardly be different.

One is ITM Power (LSE: ITM), which is still down 66% in five years despite its recent gains. Filtronic (LSE: FTC) is the other, up a staggering 2,783% over the same timescale.

ITM Power

ITM Power is all about hydrogen energy systems. And from a recent high on 28 May, it’s crashed a painful 42%. But there’s no sign of the business doing badly. In fact, it’s been racking up some impressive new contracts, and lifted its own guidance for the full year.

Enthusiasm seems to have pushed the share price a bit ahead of itself. And some investors have been selling and taking some of their recent profits. It also doesn’t help that Goldman Sachs recently issued a Sell recommendation with a 63p target — about half the current price.

The main difficulty here is putting a valuation on the shares, with the company not profitable yet — though losses are falling. Still, ITM Power has figured on ISA providers’ most-bought lists for Stocks and Shares ISAs in May and June.

Filtronic

Filtronic stormed into second place on interactive investor’s ISA favourites list for the first week of June. The company develops wireless communications technology, and it counts SpaceX as one of its customers. SpaceX also has the rights to buy up to 10% of Filtronics’ shares. So it’s perhaps not so surprising to see the price hitting the stratosphere of late.

To me, this suggests two things. One is that supplying SpaceX means that its products are likely to be among the best in the business. The other is that the SpaceX connection might also mean Filtronic shares are madly overvalued.

Filtronic looks like showing impressive profit growth in the coming years. But right now, it’s on a forward price-to-earnings (P/E) ratio of 126. That could halve by 2028 if forecasts come good. But it still makes my eyes water a bit.

Follow the favourites?

So what should Stocks and Shares ISA investors do? These are both companies that I reckon could have stellar futures in terms of earnings growth. And sometimes, a short-term high valuation for a stock can still mean a cracking long-term buy.

Investors who like that kind of white-knuckle investment can do very well, and might benefit from considering these two. But it’s a strategy that can bring the occasional wipeout along the way.

And it’s not my strategy, having left my youthful growth-stock days long behind. So I’m out, but I do intend to watch these two.

Should you invest £5,000 in Filtronic Plc right now?

When investing expert Mark Rogers and his team have a stock tip, it can pay to listen. After all, the flagship Twelfth Magpie Share Advisor newsletter he has run for nearly a decade has provided thousands of paying members with top stock recommendations from the UK and US markets.

And right now, Mark thinks there are 6 standout stocks that investors should consider buying. Want to see if Filtronic Plc made the list?

Alan Oscroft does not hold any positions in the companies mentioned.

The post These 2 FTSE 250 companies are big Stocks and Shares ISA favourites in June. Time to buy? appeared first on The Twelfth Magpie.

Some profit-taking after a run like that is entirely normal. But could something more concerning be going on beneath the surface?

What drove the surge?

The catalyst for ITM’s extraordinary rally was a string of genuinely transformational announcements. In February, the company raised its 2026 revenue guidance by over 10% to £40m-£43m, citing strong project progress and contributions from recently secured contracts.

Then in April, ITM landed the biggest moment in its recent history: a combined £86.5m government backing package, comprising a £40m equity investment from Great British Energy and a £46.5m grant from the Department for Energy Security and Net Zero (DESNZ).

For a company that was trading in penny stock territory not long ago, this was a remarkable sequence of positive news. And it isn’t surprising to see its share price jump as a result.

So why are investors now getting nervous?

Two forces converged to trigger the sell-off. The first was mechanical.

ITM Power was added to the MSCI UK Small Cap Index at the start of June, forcing passive funds to buy an estimated $25m-$30m worth of shares. Arbitrageurs who had piled in ahead of the event used that guaranteed demand to exit their positions, triggering a wave of selling that rapidly turned into a rout.

The second was more fundamental.

Analysts at Goldman Sachs reiterated a Sell recommendation on the stock, nudging its price target only modestly to 63p – far below where the shares are trading today.

Digging a bit deeper, the core concern isn’t that the business is struggling, but rather that the valuation has gotten too far ahead of itself compared to the firm’s projected path to profitability. Yet, Morgan Stanley’s 170p share price forecast suggests there may be some hidden room for growth.

So has the recent sell-off secretly created a buying opportunity?

A high-risk, high-reward bet

ITM has a genuinely differentiated technology in PEM electrolysis. It enjoys repeat blue-chip customers including Shell, RWE, and Linde. And it has effectively received the blessing of the UK government to champion the country’s emerging hydrogen economy.

That’s not something a random start-up can just replicate overnight, giving the business a genuine competitive advantage over its current and prospective rivals.

This nonetheless remains a pre-profit enterprise scaling an unproven next-generation technology. And many of its recently-secured blockbuster contracts are for projects still several years away.

So where does that leave investors today?

The bottom line

ITM Power is a genuinely exciting business operating at the frontier of the UK’s clean energy ambitions. And for investors seeking exposure to the nascent hydrogen sector, this business appears to be among the most established pure-plays on the London Stock Exchange.

However, the valuation does make me a little nervous, even after the 30% pullback. That’s not to mean this ex-penny stock could be doomed to fall further, but rather, investors should prepare and expect significant volatility moving forward. That’s why it’s staying on my watchlist for now.

Should you invest £5,000 in Itm Power Plc right now?

When investing expert Mark Rogers and his team have a stock tip, it can pay to listen. After all, the flagship Twelfth Magpie Share Advisor newsletter he has run for nearly a decade has provided thousands of paying members with top stock recommendations from the UK and US markets.

And right now, Mark thinks there are 6 standout stocks that investors should consider buying. Want to see if Itm Power Plc made the list?

Zaven Boyrazian does not hold any positions in the companies mentioned.

The post Down 30% in 2 weeks! Is ex-penny stock ITM Power now too cheap? appeared first on The Twelfth Magpie.

But it’s a bit of a curious case. The stock has been racing higher thanks to a bevy of positive factors. But the share price is still down 69% from its peak. What’s going on here? And is this a chance get in while the going’s cheap?

What happened?

The key to understanding why ITM Power is still lagging behind all-time highs is partly one of timing. The previous high was hit in early 2021 when the world was a very different place.

Low interest rates are one massive factor. The availability of cheap money made investment a more attractive proposition back then. That meant a speculative green-energy firm like ITM could raise cash with less risk.

Another problem was the increase in energy costs in the years after.

And an important point to make is the nature of the technology. The tech that ITM Power develops – called hydrolysers – takes renewable electricity and turns it into ‘green hydrogen’ where it can be stored or repurposed. This is new technology sp there’s execution riskthat might put off some investors.

Time to buy?

Here’s the other side of the coin: things might be looking up for the firm. The share price jumping from 62p to 210p inside a couple of months didn’t just come out of nowhere. It was on the back of some lucrative deals and investments.

Great British Energy (a new government initiative) has ploughed a total of £87m into the company. The money will be used for a “new 1 GW automated manufacturing line for our next-generation stack Chronos” and will create hundreds of jobs. Should things go smoothly, then this might only be the start.

In the same month, a deal with German defence firm Rheinmetall was announced. The key detail here is the company want a reliable fuel supply when electrification might not be possible – hence ITM’s products could fit the bill perfectly.

The financials support the basic takeaway here: this is a loss-making company with a potentially very bright future. Analysts expect no profit for the next two financial years. At the same time, revenue is growing consistently and at a 74% growth rate each year.

As such, there’s still plenty of risk here. But ITM Power could be a big player in the green energy revolution. And that 69% fall might be looked at as a tasty discount in years to come. I think the stock is worth considering.

Should you invest £5,000 in Itm Power Plc right now?

When investing expert Mark Rogers and his team have a stock tip, it can pay to listen. After all, the flagship Twelfth Magpie Share Advisor newsletter he has run for nearly a decade has provided thousands of paying members with top stock recommendations from the UK and US markets.

And right now, Mark thinks there are 6 standout stocks that investors should consider buying. Want to see if Itm Power Plc made the list?

John Fieldsend has no position in any of the shares mentioned.

The post Why are ITM Power shares 69% off? appeared first on The Twelfth Magpie.

As green energy excitement gripped the markets in 2021, this hydrogen penny stock surged to stellar highs, driven by its promising electrolyser technology. But then came the reality check. Production ramp-up struggles, mounting losses, and fading government support sent the stock back to earth with a thud.

But something’s changed. Over the last 12 months, ITM Power has skyrocketed by a staggering 265%! So is this just another temporary surge? Or is ITM just getting started?

What’s driving the rally?

As a quick crash course, ITM Power designs and manufactures hydrogen electrolysers. These machines split water into hydrogen and oxygen using electricity. And as the world races to decarbonise heavy industry, green hydrogen is increasingly seen as one of the few viable solutions for sectors like steel, chemicals, and long-haul transport that simply can’t run on batteries alone.

In 2021, ITM’s surge was driven almost entirely by hype and excitement. This time, the momentum stems from tangible financial results. The company reported a record £18m in first-half revenue for fiscal 2026 (ending in April) and even raised full-year guidance to between £40m and £43m, signalling an incoming 35% year-on-year jump.

What’s more, Great British Energy has injected £40m of equity as part of an £86.5m government-backed funding package. And a new collaboration with Rheinmetall for the Giga PtX project opens a strategic door into Europe’s defence sector.

And later this month, the hydrogen stock will join the MSCI UK Small Cap Index, triggering another round of buying activity from investment funds – a catalyst that’s just a few short days away.

So far, this all makes ITM Power seem like a no-brainer. So what could go wrong?

Are the risks worth taking?

Despite the improving trajectory of this business, there are some important caveats for investors to carefully consider.

ITM Power is still losing money. And the path to profitability is far from guaranteed. In fact, analysts at Morgan Stanley, who are among the most bullish institutional followers, don’t foresee any underlying earnings until 2028. And even that’s dependent on flawless execution over the next two years.

Given that bad execution is what caused ITM shares to tumble during the last surge, opinions from other institutional investors are decidedly mixed, with seven active Buy recommendations, three Hold, and two Sell.

For investors who believe management’s learned from its previous mistakes, ITM Power could indeed be among the most genuinely interesting growth stories in the market right now.

But there’s no denying that this is emphatically not a stock for the faint-hearted. Even though ITM Power is no longer a penny stock, position sizing and staying within personal risk tolerance remain crucial.

Personally, this is a business I’m watching carefully as it continues to evolve. And while I’m not quite ready to pull the trigger, investors with a higher risk tolerance may want to consider taking a closer look.

Should you invest £5,000 in Itm Power Plc right now?

When investing expert Mark Rogers and his team have a stock tip, it can pay to listen. After all, the flagship Twelfth Magpie Share Advisor newsletter he has run for nearly a decade has provided thousands of paying members with top stock recommendations from the UK and US markets.

And right now, Mark thinks there are 6 standout stocks that investors should consider buying. Want to see if Itm Power Plc made the list?

Zaven Boyrazian does not hold any positions in the companies mentioned.

The post Is ex-penny stock ITM Power one of the best growth investments in 2026? appeared first on The Twelfth Magpie.

Could it be clean energy stock ITM Power (LSE: ITM), which is experiencing a similar share price rebound at the moment?

A game-changing deal

It’s an exciting time to be an investor in ITM Power. That’s because the company – which specialises in green hydrogen solutions – has a lot of momentum.

For example, last month, it signed a deal with European defence powerhouse Rheinmetall. This will see the company potentially deploy several hundred production plants for Rheinmetall’s Giga PtX project, where the goal is to establish a Europe-wide network of decentralised synthetic fuel production plants to strengthen defence energy resilience.

This deal – which puts a rocket under its share price – looks like a game-changing moment. That’s because it offers the group the opportunity to roll out its green hydrogen solutions at scale.

Other key developments

This deal is just one of many the company has signed lately though. Others include:

• A 10-year Long-Term Service Agreement with MorGen Energy for the West Wales Hydrogen project, to provide maintenance and support to the plant in operation.
• A deal with Octopus Energy Generation to deploy its NEPTUNE V containerised green hydrogen systems at Kimberly-Clark‘s Northfleet manufacturing plant in Gravesend, Kent.
• A NEPTUNE V Basic Design Engineering Package contract with an industrial customer for a project in Australia.
• A NEPTUNE V Front-End Engineering Design contract for a project in Canada, which aims to produce hydrogen for transportation from hydroelectric power.

These have all come in the last six months. And they’ve significantly boosted the company share price.

ITM Power vs Rolls-Royce

A key difference between ITM Power and Rolls-Royce however, is profitability. Over the last few years, the latter’s has jumped dramatically due to a transformation plan implemented in early 2023. For example, last year, group operating profit was £3.5bn versus £2.5bn a year earlier. This has been a key share price driver as it’s pulled investors back in.

By contrast, ITM Power still isn’t profitable. And analysts don’t see the company’s bottom line turning black in the coming years. This could limit its base-level attraction as institutional investors tend to avoid unprofitable companies because they’re generally more risky. This, in turn, could restrict its share price growth.

One other difference worth mentioning is the valuation. When Rolls-Royce was near its low, it had a price-to-sales ratio under one, meaning it was really, really cheap. Today, ITM Power’s price-to-sales ratio is about 38. That means it’s actually quite expensive.

So it may not be the ‘next Rolls-Royce’.

Worth a look?

That said, ITM Power shares could still be worth considering as a speculative investment. It clearly has some effective clean energy technology and if it can keep winning deals and increasing its revenue, its share price may continue to rise.

‘Speculative’ is the key word here though. This is the kind of stock that could double or triple from here… or fall 80%-90%.

The post Up 157% in 2026, are ITM Power shares the next Rolls-Royce? appeared first on The Twelfth Magpie.

What was top of the sell list? Not heavyweights like Rolls-Royce, Shell or AstraZeneca, not even a FTSE 100 company at all, but FTSE AIM-listed ITM Power with a market cap of just over £1bn. The Sheffield-based green energy company made up for nearly one in every 50 sell trades made on the platform! Let’s answer the questions you are probably wondering: What’s going on here? And why is everyone selling the stock?

Hot property

The first thing to point out: this is a very hot property. The ITM Power share price has had a monster of a year, rising from around 30p last May to over 150p today. There aren’t many stocks anywhere that have risen five times over the last year, so it’s natural that the company is getting a lot of attention.

Following on from that is that there is likely some profit-taking being done. In other words, investors who held the stock are looking to realise the gains, perhaps fearing that some of the surge in share price could be reversed due to volatility.

While we at The Motley Fool prefer to hold stocks over the long term – ideally, that means 10 years or longer – it’s fairly common for investors to see their portfolios climb and want to consolidate some of the profits.

Of course, the real question for those of us who haven’t invested is whether it’s a good buy today. Can the ITM share price continue its rapid ascent? There are two key questions here, as far as I see it.

Two question marks

First question – is this technology going to be viable and useful? The hydrolysers ITM Power manufactures can take energy from renewable sources and convert them to hydrogen to be used later. This kind of energy storage has potential. And the recent deals booked with Great British Energy and the German company Rheinmetall are two big votes of confidence that hydrolysers may have a big role to play in the green energy revolution.

Second question – can the company make money? ITM Power is still loss-making and will be for a while yet. While revenue is soaring (it’s expected to triple by 2027), the sticking point here will be whether the firm turns a profit on its products. It’s worth pointing out here that this is not a new company – it’s been around since the year 2000.

Overall? I can see why ITM Power shares are getting a lot of attention these days. There are still question marks hanging over the stock, but for investors aware of the risk profile, I think it could be worth considering.

The post Why is everyone selling ITM Power shares? appeared first on The Twelfth Magpie.

So, what’s going on here? And is the stock – which has more than doubled year to date – worth considering as a growth investment today?

A fast-growing renewable energy company

Before I look at what has pushed the ITM share price higher, it’s worth explaining what this company does. Because it isn’t very well known.

Founded in 2000, ITM Power is a green hydrogen company. Today, it designs and manufactures PEM (proton exchange membrane) electrolysers – sophisticated renewable energy devices that use electricity to spit water molecules into hydrogen and oxygen.

In recent years, the company has grown its revenue significantly thanks to deals with a range of industrial companies (revenue climbed from £3m to £26m between FY20 and FY25). Yet it’s still not profitable, meaning that it’s higher up the risk spectrum from an investment perspective.

Why has the share price exploded?

In terms of the latest share price move, it’s down to a deal with Rheinmetall. On Friday (17 April), ITM announced that it has entered a strategic collaboration with the German defence powerhouse.

This collaboration will focus on Rheinmetall’s Giga PtX project, which aims to establish a Europe-wide network of decentralised synthetic fuel production plants for the NATO armed forces with the goal of strengthening defence energy resilience. The two companies envisage the deployment of several hundred decentralised production plants across Europe – each with an electrolysis capacity of up to 50 MW – capable of producing approximately 5,000 to 7,000 tonnes of e-fuel per annum per facility.

This collaboration is obviously a big deal for ITM Power. Not only has the company partnered with one of Europe’s leading defence companies (which obviously sees its green hydrogen technology as attractive) but it looks like there’s the opportunity to roll out its solutions at scale.

“The Giga PtX project represents a repeatable deployment opportunity for large-scale electrolysers”
Dennis Schulz, CEO of ITM Power

Worth a look?

Is ITM Power worth considering as a growth investment today? Well, it could be (as a very speculative investment).

This isn’t the type of stock I’d load up. Because it’s very risky.

As I mentioned earlier, the company isn’t profitable. Over the last five years, it has consistently lost a lot of money despite its prolific revenue growth, and analysts don’t expect the group to be profitable any time soon.

Meanwhile, its share price can be very volatile. In recent years, it has shot up on a number of occasions (check out the spike in 2020/2021), only to come crashing down shortly after.

As for the valuation, it’s pretty high if we look at the price-to-sales ratio (we can’t use price-to-earnings as there’s no earnings). It currently sits at about 30.

But there’s definitely potential here given the deals the company is doing with other firms. So, it could be worthy of further research.

The post £5,000 invested in red-hot UK growth stock ITM Power 5 days ago is now worth… appeared first on The Twelfth Magpie.

All it could take is £500 a month, a good investing strategy, and a bit of patience. Here’s how.

The mistake many make

It may be tempting for new ISA investors to chase the most popular and fastest-growing shares on the market. After all, who doesn’t love the idea of getting rich quick, especially when everyone else seems to be making loads of money?

This fear of missing out (FOMO) is the most common trap investors can fall into. And even experienced professionals can end up getting caught out by it. Perhaps a perfect recent example of this in action is hydrogen-related stocks in 2020.

With the pandemic giving way to a ‘green recovery’ narrative supported by the government’s UK Hydrogen Strategy and Europe’s EU Green Deal, hydrogen stocks were all the rage. And ITM Power (LSE:ITM) in particular saw its market cap explode by roughly 2,440% between January 2019 and 2021 as customer orders came flooding in.

Just to put this into perspective, this momentum would have transformed £1,000 into £25,400 in the space of just two years!

But while everyone was getting swept up by FOMO, most were overlooking what now seems obvious – ITM Power didn’t have the infrastructure or scale to actually deliver customer orders on time. What followed was a complete and utter collapse of the share price that’s still down 90% from its 2021 peak.

A better approach

Rather than looking at what’s popular, a better strategy is often to look for businesses that are unpopular. Why? Because, while the market’s distracted by the next shiny new thing, potentially fantastic companies can be overlooked, allowing investors to buy top-notch stocks at attractive prices.

With that in mind, let’s take a look at ITM Power again.

At around 65p, the hydrogen stock is still nowhere near its 2021 peak levels. Yet while most investors have lost interest in this space, this business has recently made some substantial progress. Its order book has been restructured, and the product portfolio simplified. And subsequently, orders are finally being fulfilled.

2025 delivered record sales, while losses are steadily shrinking as older, lower-margin contracts are phased out and replaced by new, more profitable deals. Looking ahead to 2026, revenue’s expected to reach yet another record high of up to £40m, with losses shrinking even further.

ITM Power stock is still trading at a lofty valuation even after its collapse. The difference is, this time, it’s nowhere near as extreme and it’s actually got fundamentals backing it up. That’s why it could be worth a deeper dive today.

The bottom line

Throughout the history of the stock market, quality at a reasonable price has almost always trumped hype and FOMO over the long term. And even if a portfolio only musters a 10% annualised return, consistently investing £500 a month at this slightly higher than average rate will grow an ISA beyond the £1m threshold in roughly 29 years when starting from scratch.

The post How to invest £500 a month in an ISA to aim for a million appeared first on The Twelfth Magpie.

The hydrogen stock is up just shy of 80% since January, transforming a £5,000 initial investment into a whopping £8,971.50.

But with industrial demand on the rise, could this be just the tip of the iceberg for investors? And if so, how much money could they make by this time next year?

ITM Power’s second wind

Back in 2021, when even unprofitable hydrogen stocks could do no wrong, ITM Power saw its share price skyrocket on excitement from over-eager investors. This valuation surge unsurprisingly reversed once investor expectations collided with reality.

Skip ahead to 2025, and this hydrogen business is once again marching upwards. But this time, it has the fundamentals backing it up.

Following its botched initial transition to commercial production, management streamlined the group’s electrolyser offerings, simplifying the order book and its supply chains. And with orders finally starting to be fulfilled, ITM’s revenue stream has been rapidly expanding.

In fact, following a recent trading update, sales are currently on track to reach as high as £40m by the end of its 2026 fiscal year (ending in April). That presents as 53% increase year on year, driven by a record order backlog that keeps growing, not because of delayed deliveries like in the past, but because of new profitable contracts from a growing list of clients.

What to watch

With ITM Power seemingly surpassing a critical inflexion point in its business, there’s a lot to be excited about moving forward. And looking at the latest analyst forecasts, it seems most institutional experts agree, with Berenberg Bank issuing a 100p price target and Jefferies upgrading its projection to as high as 115p.

That means a £5,000 investment today could grow to as much as £8,956 by this time next year. However, even with strong conviction from professionals, it’s important to recognise the risks surrounding this still-young enterprise.

Despite tremendous improvement in revenues and cash flows, ITM Power remains an unprofitable enterprise. And a big contributor is that around 40% of the group’s order book consists of legacy and largely unprofitable contracts.

As these are cleared out and the company scales its operations, margins should start to move in the right direction. And to be fair, there are already some early signs of this happening with losses for its 2026 fiscal year on track to reach £29m versus £33m a year ago.

Something else to keep an eye on is the evolving competitive landscape. Several green electrolysis companies have started to pop up both across Europe and Asia. And if rival innovation leads to cheaper or more efficient alternatives, ITM Power could find its order book drying up quickly.

The bottom line

Even at around 65p, the shares are not cheap. However, unlike in early 2021, the business today has both rapidly expanding cash flows and early signs of a path to profitability.

There’s no denying it will continue to be a volatile stock. But given the market opportunity in this burgeoning industry, even with a premium valuation, this hydrogen stock could be worth a closer look.

The post £5,000 invested in ITM Power shares at the start of 2025 is now worth… appeared first on The Twelfth Magpie.

This all comes with the backdrop of an awful few years for the stock. Before this year’s run up, the shares had fallen by 96% in only four years. The current 71p share price looks like it might be cheap compared to the all-time high of 640p hit back in 2021. What’s going on here? And with a potentially huge role in a green future, is this a renewable energy stock that could surge long into the future?

Potential

The potential around ITM Power is its possible role as a key link in the Net Zero revolution. The firm produces hydrolysers, which in simple terms take energy like that from solar or wind and convert it into hydrogen. This hydrogen can be stored more cheaply or used for other purposes.

This kind of technology promises to be a game-changer for countries like the UK, which creates a lot of excess renewable energy. Britain spends hundreds of millions of pounds a year to turn off wind turbines. Hydrolysers could be one solution to that kind of waste.

This isn’t pie in the sky stuff either. ITM Power has been in existence since 2000 and its hydrolysers started being sold in 2010. The firm notably signed contracts to deliver two 100MW hydrolysers for a plant in Lingen, Germany. It’s also working on a deal with oil giant Shell.

Why has the stock been surging this year? It’s down to a string of orders, largely coming from Europe. Compare the firm’s revenue for financial years 2023 (£5m), 2024 (£17m) and 2025 (£26m). The next financial year is expected to come in at £40m too. This is incredible growth although it must be pointed out the firm still isn’t turning a profit.

The future

So what do we have here? An exciting stock with a compelling growth story and surging revenue, with the big caveat that it’s still pre-profit and trading at over 10 times sales. Stop me if you think you’ve heard this one before.

The reality is that ITM Power is still a highly speculative investment. The future of hydrolysers in green energy is extremely uncertain and pretty much no one can predict where they will be in 10 or 20 years.

As such, I’d class this as a high-risk, high-reward stock. I have a small part of my own portfolio in such investments. They can be big winners, and therefore I’d say ITM Power is worthy of consideration for those who understand the risks.

The post What on earth is going on with ITM Power shares? appeared first on The Twelfth Magpie.