Yahoo Finance The 10% return this week takes Heidrick & Struggles International's (NASDAQ:HSII) shareholders five-year gains to 42%
If you buy and hold a stock for many years, you'd hope to be making a profit. Better yet, you'd like to see the share price move up more than the market average. Unfortunately for shareholders, while the Heidrick & Struggles International, Inc. (NASDAQ:HSII) share price is up 30% in the last five years, that's less than the market return. Unfortunately the share price is down 24% in the last year.
On the back of a solid 7-day performance, let's check what role the company's fundamentals have played in driving long term shareholder returns.
View our latest analysis for Heidrick & Struggles International
While markets are a powerful pricing mechanism, share prices reflect investor sentiment, not just 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.
During the five years of share price growth, Heidrick & Struggles International moved from a loss to profitability. That would generally be considered a positive, so we'd expect the share price to be up. Given that the company made a profit three years ago, but not five years ago, it is worth looking at the share price returns over the last three years, too. Indeed, the Heidrick & Struggles International share price has gained 18% in three years. During the same period, EPS grew by 15% each year. This EPS growth is higher than the 6% average annual increase in the share price over the same three years. Therefore, it seems the market has moderated its expectations for growth, somewhat. This cautious sentiment is reflected in its (fairly low) P/E ratio of 8.56.
The company's earnings per share (over time) is depicted in the image below (click to see the exact numbers).
We know that Heidrick & Struggles International has improved its bottom line lately, but is it going to grow revenue? If you're interested, you could check this free report showing consensus revenue forecasts.
What About Dividends?
It is important to consider the total shareholder return, as well as the share price return, for any given stock. 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. In the case of Heidrick & Struggles International, it has a TSR of 42% for the last 5 years. That exceeds its share price return that we previously mentioned. And there's no prize for guessing that the dividend payments largely explain the divergence!
A Different Perspective
We regret to report that Heidrick & Struggles International shareholders are down 23% for the year (even including dividends). Unfortunately, that's worse than the broader market decline of 8.1%. Having said that, it's inevitable that some stocks will be oversold in a falling market. The key is to keep your eyes on the fundamental developments. On the bright side, long term shareholders have made money, with a gain of 7% per year over half a decade. If the fundamental data continues to indicate long term sustainable growth, the current sell-off could be an opportunity worth considering. 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. Even so, be aware that Heidrick & Struggles International is showing 1 warning sign in our investment analysis , you should know about...
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Please note, the market returns quoted in this article reflect the market weighted average returns of stocks that currently trade on US exchanges.
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This article by Simply Wall St is general in nature. We provide commentary based on historical data and analyst forecasts only using an unbiased methodology and our articles are not intended to be financial advice. It does not constitute a recommendation to buy or sell any stock, and does not take account of your objectives, or your financial situation. We aim to bring you long-term focused analysis driven by fundamental data. Note that our analysis may not factor in the latest price-sensitive company announcements or qualitative material. Simply Wall St has no position in any stocks mentioned.
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