Investors five-year losses continue as Bank of Queensland (ASX:BOQ) dips a further 3.8% this week, earnings continue to decline

Ideally, your overall portfolio should beat the market average. But the main game is to find enough winners to more than offset the losers At this point some shareholders may be questioning their investment in Bank of Queensland Limited (ASX:BOQ), since the last five years saw the share price fall 44%.

With the stock having lost 3.8% 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 Bank of Queensland

To quote Buffett, 'Ships will sail around the world but the Flat Earth Society will flourish. There will continue to be wide discrepancies between price and value in the marketplace...' 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.

Looking back five years, both Bank of Queensland's share price and EPS declined; the latter at a rate of 6.5% per year. This reduction in EPS is less than the 11% annual reduction in the share price. This implies that the market was previously too optimistic about the stock. The low P/E ratio of 10.98 further reflects this reticence.

The image below shows how EPS has tracked over time (if you click on the image you can see greater detail).

We consider it positive that insiders have made significant purchases in the last year. Having said that, most people consider earnings and revenue growth trends to be a more meaningful guide to the business. Dive deeper into the earnings by checking this interactive graph of Bank of Queensland's earnings, revenue and cash flow.

What 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. It's fair to say that the TSR gives a more complete picture for stocks that pay a dividend. We note that for Bank of Queensland the TSR over the last 5 years was -24%, which is better than the share price return mentioned above. This is largely a result of its dividend payments!

A Different Perspective

Bank of Queensland shareholders are down 0.9% for the year (even including dividends), but the market itself is up 2.8%. 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. Unfortunately, longer term shareholders are suffering worse, given the loss of 4% doled out over the last five years. We'd need to see some sustained improvements in the key metrics before we could muster much enthusiasm. It's always interesting to track share price performance over the longer term. But to understand Bank of Queensland better, we need to consider many other factors. Even so, be aware that Bank of Queensland is showing 2 warning signs in our investment analysis , and 1 of those doesn't sit too well with us...

There are plenty of other companies that have insiders buying up shares. You probably do not want to miss this free list 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 AU exchanges.

Have feedback on this article? Concerned about the content? Get in touch with us directly. Alternatively, email editorial-team@simplywallst.com

Simply Wall St analyst Simply Wall St and Simply Wall St have no position in any of the companies mentioned. This article 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.

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