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If you buy and hold a stock for many years, you'd hope to be making a profit. Furthermore, you'd generally like to see the share price rise faster than the market. Unfortunately for shareholders, while the Sapiens International Corporation N.V. (NASDAQ:SPNS) share price is up 52% in the last five years, that's less than the market return. The last year has been disappointing, with the stock price down 5.4% in that time.
Let's take a look at the underlying fundamentals over the longer term, and see if they've been consistent with shareholders returns.
Check out our latest analysis for Sapiens International
In his essay The Superinvestors of Graham-and-Doddsville Warren Buffett described how share prices do not always rationally reflect the value of a business. One imperfect but simple way to consider how the market perception of a company has shifted is to compare the change in the earnings per share (EPS) with the share price movement.
Over half a decade, Sapiens International managed to grow its earnings per share at 20% a year. This EPS growth is higher than the 9% average annual increase in the share price. Therefore, it seems the market has become relatively pessimistic about the company.
The image below shows how EPS has tracked over time (if you click on the image you can see greater detail).
We know that Sapiens International has improved its bottom line lately, but is it going to grow revenue? This free report showing analyst revenue forecasts should help you figure out if the EPS growth can be sustained.
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. So for companies that pay a generous dividend, the TSR is often a lot higher than the share price return. In the case of Sapiens International, it has a TSR of 65% for the last 5 years. That exceeds its share price return that we previously mentioned. The dividends paid by the company have thusly boosted the total shareholder return.
A Different Perspective
Investors in Sapiens International had a tough year, with a total loss of 3.8% (including dividends), against a market gain of about 16%. Even the share prices of good stocks drop sometimes, but we want to see improvements in the fundamental metrics of a business, before getting too interested. Longer term investors wouldn't be so upset, since they would have made 11%, each year, over five years. It could be that the recent sell-off is an opportunity, so it may be worth checking the fundamental data for signs of a long term growth trend. Is Sapiens International cheap compared to other companies? These 3 valuation measures might help you decide.