过去5年2.4%的收益增长并不足以为Ocean First Financial(纳斯达克：OFFC)的股东带来正回报

For many, the main point of investing is to generate higher returns than the overall market. But in any portfolio, there will be mixed results between individual stocks. At this point some shareholders may be questioning their investment inOceanFirst Financial Corp.(NASDAQ:OCFC), since the last five years saw the share price fall 35%. Shareholders have had an even rougher run lately, with the share price down 17% in the last 90 days.

With the stock having lost 6.8% in the past week, it's worth taking a look at business performance and seeing if there's any red flags.

See our latest analysis for OceanFirst Financial

While markets are a powerful pricing mechanism, share prices reflect investor sentiment, not just underlying business performance. One way to examine how market sentiment has changed over time is to look at the interaction between a company's share price and its earnings per share (EPS).

While the share price declined over five years, OceanFirst Financial actually managed toincreaseEPS by an average of 12% per year. Given the share price reaction, one might suspect that EPS is not a good guide to the business performance during the period (perhaps due to a one-off loss or gain). Or possibly, the market was previously very optimistic, so the stock has disappointed, despite improving EPS.

Due to the lack of correlation between the EPS growth and the falling share price, it's worth taking a look at other metrics to try to understand the share price movement.

Revenue is actually up 17% over the time period. A more detailed examination of the revenue and earnings may or may not explain why the share price languishes; there could be an opportunity.

The image below shows how earnings and revenue have tracked over time (if you click on the image you can see greater detail).NasdaqGS:OCFC Earnings and Revenue Growth April 28th 2022

We consider it positive that insiders have made significant purchases in the last year. Even so, future earnings will be far more important to whether current shareholders make money. So we recommend checking out thisfreereport showing consensus forecastsWhat About Dividends?

As well as measuring the share price return, investors should also consider the total shareholder return (TSR). The TSR is a return calculation that accounts for the value of cash dividends (assuming that any dividend received was reinvested) and the calculated value of any discounted capital raisings and spin-offs. So for companies that pay a generous dividend, the TSR is often a lot higher than the share price return. We note that for OceanFirst Financial the TSR over the last 5 years was -24%, which is better than the share price return mentioned above. And there's no prize for guessing that the dividend payments largely explain the divergence!A Different Perspective

While the broader market lost about 7.2% in the twelve months, OceanFirst Financial shareholders did even worse, losing 18% (even including dividends). 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. Unfortunately, last year's performance may indicate unresolved challenges, given that it was worse than the annualised loss of 4% over the last half decade. We realise that Baron Rothschild has said investors should "buy when there is blood on the streets", but we caution that investors should first be sure they are buying a high quality business. It's always interesting to track share price performance over the longer term. But to understand OceanFirst Financial better, we need to consider many other factors. Consider risks, for instance. Every company has them, and we've spotted 2 warning signs for OceanFirst Financial you should know about.

There are plenty of other companies that have insiders buying up shares. You probably donotwant to miss thisfreelist of growing companies that insiders are buying.

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.