Yahoo Finance Huntington Ingalls Industries' (NYSE:HII) 4.0% CAGR outpaced the company's earnings growth over the same five-year period
The main point of investing for the long term is to make money. Better yet, you'd like to see the share price move up more than the market average. Unfortunately for shareholders, while the Huntington Ingalls Industries, Inc. (NYSE:HII) share price is up 11% in the last five years, that's less than the market return. Zooming in, the stock is actually down 0.8% in the last year.
After a strong gain in the past week, it's worth seeing if longer term returns have been driven by improving fundamentals.
Check out our latest analysis for Huntington Ingalls Industries
To paraphrase Benjamin Graham: Over the short term the market is a voting machine, but over the long term it's a weighing machine. 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, Huntington Ingalls Industries achieved compound earnings per share (EPS) growth of 2.3% per year. So the EPS growth rate is rather close to the annualized share price gain of 2% per year. This indicates that investor sentiment towards the company has not changed a great deal. In fact, the share price seems to largely reflect the EPS growth.
The graphic below depicts how EPS has changed over time (unveil the exact values by clicking on the image).
It's probably worth noting that the CEO is paid less than the median at similar sized companies. It's always worth keeping an eye on CEO pay, but a more important question is whether the company will grow earnings throughout the years. It might be well worthwhile taking a look at our free report on Huntington Ingalls Industries' earnings, revenue and cash flow.
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. So for companies that pay a generous dividend, the TSR is often a lot higher than the share price return. As it happens, Huntington Ingalls Industries' TSR for the last 5 years was 21%, which exceeds the share price return mentioned earlier. This is largely a result of its dividend payments!
A Different Perspective
It's nice to see that Huntington Ingalls Industries shareholders have received a total shareholder return of 1.6% over the last year. And that does include the dividend. Having said that, the five-year TSR of 4% a year, is even better. Potential buyers might understandably feel they've missed the opportunity, but it's always possible business is still firing on all cylinders. 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 Huntington Ingalls Industries is showing 2 warning signs in our investment analysis , and 1 of those is significant...
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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.
