What happened Shares of Jumia Technologies (NYSE: JMIA), an e-commerce and digital-payments company in Africa, were crushed on Tuesday after the company reported business results for the third quarter of 2020. Investors' expectations were riding high under the assumption the COVID-19 pandemic was pushing Jumia's adoption. But revenue was down for the quarter. This led to the stock being down 23% as of 10:15 a.m. EST. So what Jumia's total Q3 revenue fell almost 18% year over year. Looking at just its e-commerce operations, gross merchandise volume fell a more pronounced 28% from last year. Investors had bid the stock up about 100% in 2020 in anticipation of a big quarter. Needless to say, this isn't what they had in mind. Image source: Getty Images. Now what Perhaps Wall Street is missing the bigger picture here. A breakdown of Jumia's results reveals a sharp decline in first-party revenue -- products Jumia used to sell directly. However, the company has intentionally shifted to become more of a third-party platform company. In this way, the decline in first-party revenue and the resulting drag on overall results should have been anticipated. Looking at other important metrics for long-term investors, there are some encouraging signs. First, annual active customers rose 23% year over year to 6.7 million. Second, the shift from first-party to third-party sales is more profitable for Jumia, with gross profit increasing 23% from last year. Finally, total payment volume for JumiaPay was up an impressive 50% from the third quarter of 2019. In my opinion, Jumia's improvement in these three areas makes it a company worthy of deeper research. With Africa in the early stages of a digital revolution, the company might finally be making all the right moves in 2020 after a string of miscues shortly after going public. 10 stocks we like better than Jumia Technologies AG-ADRWhen investing geniuses David and Tom Gardner have a stock tip, it can pay to listen. After all, the newsletter they have run for over a decade, Motley Fool Stock Advisor, has tripled the market.* David and Tom just revealed what they believe are the ten best stocks for investors to buy right now... and Jumia Technologies AG-ADR wasn't one of them! That's right -- they think these 10 stocks are even better buys. See the 10 stocks *Stock Advisor returns as of October 20, 2020 Jon Quast has no position in any of the stocks mentioned. The Motley Fool has no position in any of the stocks mentioned. The Motley Fool has a disclosure policy.Source