Investors in B&G Foods (NYSE:BGS) have unfortunately lost 0.5% over the last five years

For many, the main point of investing is to generate higher returns than the overall market. But every investor is virtually certain to have both over-performing and under-performing stocks. At this point some shareholders may be questioning their investment in B&G Foods, Inc. (NYSE:BGS), since the last five years saw the share price fall 31%. In contrast, the stock price has popped 8.9% in the last thirty days.

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.

View our latest analysis for B&G Foods

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.

Looking back five years, both B&G Foods' share price and EPS declined; the latter at a rate of 11% per year. This fall in the EPS is worse than the 7% compound annual share price fall. So the market may previously have expected a drop, or else it expects the situation will improve.

The company's earnings per share (over time) is depicted in the image below (click to see the exact numbers).

This free interactive report on B&G Foods' earnings, revenue and cash flow is a great place to start, if you want to investigate the stock further.

What About Dividends?

When looking at investment returns, it is important to consider the difference between total shareholder return (TSR) and share price return. The TSR incorporates the value of any spin-offs or discounted capital raisings, along with any dividends, based on the assumption that the dividends are reinvested. Arguably, the TSR gives a more comprehensive picture of the return generated by a stock. As it happens, B&G Foods' TSR for the last 5 years was -0.5%, which exceeds the share price return mentioned earlier. And there's no prize for guessing that the dividend payments largely explain the divergence!

A Different Perspective

The total return of 19% received by B&G Foods shareholders over the last year isn't far from the market return of -19%. So last year was actually even worse than the last five years, which cost shareholders 0.1% per year. It will probably take a substantial improvement in the fundamental performance for the company to reverse this trend. It's always interesting to track share price performance over the longer term. But to understand B&G Foods better, we need to consider many other factors. Even so, be aware that B&G Foods is showing 5 warning signs in our investment analysis , and 2 of those don't sit too well with us...

But note: B&G Foods may not be the best stock to buy. So take a peek at this free list of interesting companies with past earnings growth (and further growth forecast).

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.