The worst result, after buying shares in a company (assuming no leverage), would be if you lose all the money you put in. But when you pick a company that is really flourishing, you can make more than 100%. Long term K&S Corporation Limited (ASX:KSC) shareholders would be well aware of this, since the stock is up 145% in five years. The last week saw the share price soften some 2.1%.

Now it’s worth having a look at the company’s fundamentals too, because that will help us determine if the long term shareholder return has matched the performance of the underlying business.

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There is no denying that markets are sometimes efficient, but prices do not always reflect underlying business performance. One imperfect but simple way to consider how the market perception of a company has shifted is to compare the change in the earnings per share (EPS) with the share price movement.

Over half a decade, K&S managed to grow its earnings per share at 20% a year. That makes the EPS growth particularly close to the yearly share price growth of 20%. This indicates that investor sentiment towards the company has not changed a great deal. Rather, the share price has approximately tracked EPS growth.

You can see below how EPS has changed over time (discover the exact values by clicking on the image).

It might be well worthwhile taking a look at our free report on K&S’ earnings, revenue and cash flow.

As well as measuring the share price return, investors should also consider the total shareholder return (TSR). 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. In the case of K&S, it has a TSR of 217% for the last 5 years. That exceeds its share price return that we previously mentioned. This is largely a result of its dividend payments!

Investors in K&S had a tough year, with a total loss of 5.9% (including dividends), against a market gain of about 12%. 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. On the bright side, long term shareholders have made money, with a gain of 26% per year over half a decade. It could be that the recent sell-off is an opportunity, so it may be worth checking the fundamental data for signs of a long term growth trend. It’s always interesting to track share price performance over the longer term. But to understand K&S better, we need to consider many other factors. To that end, you should be aware of the 2 warning signs we’ve spotted with K&S .