The truth is that if you invest for long enough, you're going to end up with some losing stocks. Long term Commercial Vehicle Group, Inc. (NASDAQ:CVGI) shareholders know that all too well, since the share price is down considerably over three years. Regrettably, they have had to cope with a 53% drop in the share price over that period. And over the last year the share price fell 48%, so we doubt many shareholders are delighted. Furthermore, it's down 17% in about a quarter. That's not much fun for holders.

So let's have a look and see if the longer term performance of the company has been in line with the underlying business' progress.

Check out our latest analysis for Commercial Vehicle Group

While markets are a powerful pricing mechanism, share prices reflect investor sentiment, not just underlying business performance. By comparing earnings per share (EPS) and share price changes over time, we can get a feel for how investor attitudes to a company have morphed over time.

During five years of share price growth, Commercial Vehicle Group moved from a loss to profitability. That would generally be considered a positive, so we are surprised to see the share price is down. So it's worth looking at other metrics to try to understand the share price move.

We note that, in three years, revenue has actually grown at a 4.5% annual rate, so that doesn't seem to be a reason to sell shares. It's probably worth investigating Commercial Vehicle Group 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).

We know that Commercial Vehicle Group has improved its bottom line lately, but what does the future have in store? You can see what analysts are predicting for Commercial Vehicle Group in this interactive graph of future profit estimates.

A Different Perspective

While the broader market gained around 23% in the last year, Commercial Vehicle Group shareholders lost 48%. 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. Unfortunately, last year's performance may indicate unresolved challenges, given that it was worse than the annualised loss of 5% over the last half decade. Generally speaking long term share price weakness can be a bad sign, though contrarian investors might want to research the stock in hope of a turnaround. 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. Case in point: We've spotted 3 warning signs for Commercial Vehicle Group you should be aware of, and 1 of them is potentially serious.