The truth is that if you invest for long enough, you're going to end up with some losing stocks. Long term Advanced Emissions Solutions, Inc. (NASDAQ:ADES) shareholders know that all too well, since the share price is down considerably over three years. Unfortunately, they have held through a 61% decline in the share price in that time. The more recent news is of little comfort, with the share price down 35% in a year. Furthermore, it's down 19% in about a quarter. That's not much fun for holders.

With that in mind, it's worth seeing if the company's underlying fundamentals have been the driver of long term performance, or if there are some discrepancies.

Check out our latest analysis for Advanced Emissions Solutions

There is no denying that markets are sometimes efficient, but prices do not always reflect underlying business performance. 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.

Advanced Emissions Solutions became profitable within the last five years. We would usually expect to see the share price rise as a result. So given the share price is down it's worth checking some other metrics too.

Revenue is actually up 26% over the three years, so the share price drop doesn't seem to hinge on revenue, either. It's probably worth investigating Advanced Emissions Solutions further; while we may be missing something on this analysis, there might also be an opportunity.

The company's revenue and earnings (over time) are depicted in the image below (click to see the exact numbers).

Take a more thorough look at Advanced Emissions Solutions' financial health with this free report on its balance sheet.

What About The Total Shareholder Return (TSR)?

We'd be remiss not to mention the difference between Advanced Emissions Solutions' total shareholder return (TSR) and its share price return. Arguably the TSR is a more complete return calculation because it accounts for the value of dividends (as if they were reinvested), along with the hypothetical value of any discounted capital that have been offered to shareholders. Advanced Emissions Solutions' TSR of was a loss of 59% for the 3 years. That wasn't as bad as its share price return, because it has paid dividends.

A Different Perspective

We regret to report that Advanced Emissions Solutions shareholders are down 35% for the year. Unfortunately, that's worse than the broader market decline of 11%. However, it could simply be that the share price has been impacted by broader market jitters. It might be worth keeping an eye on the fundamentals, in case there's a good opportunity. Unfortunately, last year's performance may indicate unresolved challenges, given that it was worse than the annualised loss of 7% over the last half decade. We realise that Baron Rothschild has said investors should "buy when there is blood on the streets", but we caution that investors should first be sure they are buying a high quality business. 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. To that end, you should learn about the 3 warning signs we've spotted with Advanced Emissions Solutions (including 2 which don't sit too well with us) .