The most you can lose on any stock (assuming you don't use leverage) is 100% of your money. But if you buy shares in a really great company, you can more than double your money. For example, the Beacon Lighting Group Limited (ASX:BLX) share price has soared 111% in the last three years. How nice for those who held the stock! Better yet, the share price has risen 12% in the last week.

Since it's been a strong week for Beacon Lighting Group shareholders, let's have a look at trend of the longer term fundamentals.

Check out our latest analysis for Beacon Lighting Group

To quote Buffett, 'Ships will sail around the world but the Flat Earth Society will flourish. There will continue to be wide discrepancies between price and value in the marketplace...' One flawed but reasonable way to assess how sentiment around a company has changed is to compare the earnings per share (EPS) with the share price.

Beacon Lighting Group was able to grow its EPS at 23% per year over three years, sending the share price higher. We don't think it is entirely coincidental that the EPS growth is reasonably close to the 28% average annual increase in the share price. This suggests that sentiment and expectations have not changed drastically. Quite to the contrary, the share price has arguably reflected the EPS growth.

The company's earnings per share (over time) is depicted in the image below (click to see the exact numbers).

We're pleased to report that the CEO is remunerated more modestly than most CEOs at similarly capitalized companies. It's always worth keeping an eye on CEO pay, but a more important question is whether the company will grow earnings throughout the years. Dive deeper into the earnings by checking this interactive graph of Beacon Lighting Group's earnings, revenue and cash flow.

What About Dividends?

When looking at investment returns, it is important to consider the difference between total shareholder return (TSR) and share price return. The TSR is a return calculation that accounts for the value of cash dividends (assuming that any dividend received was reinvested) and the calculated value of any discounted capital raisings and spin-offs. So for companies that pay a generous dividend, the TSR is often a lot higher than the share price return. As it happens, Beacon Lighting Group's TSR for the last 3 years was 140%, which exceeds the share price return mentioned earlier. And there's no prize for guessing that the dividend payments largely explain the divergence!

A Different Perspective

We're pleased to report that Beacon Lighting Group shareholders have received a total shareholder return of 46% over one year. That's including the dividend. That gain is better than the annual TSR over five years, which is 11%. Therefore it seems like sentiment around the company has been positive lately. Someone with an optimistic perspective could view the recent improvement in TSR as indicating that the business itself is getting better with time. I find it very interesting to look at share price over the long term as a proxy for business performance. But to truly gain insight, we need to consider other information, too. Take risks, for example - Beacon Lighting Group has 2 warning signs we think you should be aware of.