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Home Bancshares, Inc. (Conway, AR) (NYSE:HOMB) shareholders have seen the share price descend 11% over the month. But the silver lining is the stock is up over five years. Unfortunately its return of 44% is below the market return of 98%.
While this past week has detracted from the company's five-year return, let's look at the recent trends of the underlying business and see if the gains have been in alignment.
Check out our latest analysis for Home Bancshares (Conway AR)
To paraphrase Benjamin Graham: Over the short term the market is a voting machine, but over the long term it's a weighing machine. One way to examine how market sentiment has changed over time is to look at the interaction between a company's share price and its earnings per share (EPS).
Over half a decade, Home Bancshares (Conway AR) managed to grow its earnings per share at 2.8% a year. This EPS growth is slower than the share price growth of 8% per year, over the same period. So it's fair to assume the market has a higher opinion of the business than it did five years ago. And that's hardly shocking given the track record of growth.
The company's earnings per share (over time) is depicted in the image below (click to see the exact numbers).
We consider it positive that insiders have made significant purchases in the last year. Even so, future earnings will be far more important to whether current shareholders make money. Dive deeper into the earnings by checking this interactive graph of Home Bancshares (Conway AR)'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. Whereas the share price return only reflects the change in the share price, the TSR includes the value of dividends (assuming they were reinvested) and the benefit of any discounted capital raising or spin-off. It's fair to say that the TSR gives a more complete picture for stocks that pay a dividend. As it happens, Home Bancshares (Conway AR)'s TSR for the last 5 years was 67%, 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
Home Bancshares (Conway AR) shareholders are up 15% for the year (even including dividends). But that return falls short of the market. The silver lining is that the gain was actually better than the average annual return of 11% per year over five year. This suggests the company might be improving over time. While it is well worth considering the different impacts that market conditions can have on the share price, there are other factors that are even more important. For instance, we've identified 1 warning sign for Home Bancshares (Conway AR) that you should be aware of.