Investors in Haitian International Holdings (HKG:1882) have seen returns of 21% over the past year

A diverse portfolio of stocks will always have winners and losers. Of course, in an ideal world, all your stocks would beat the market. One such company is Haitian International Holdings Limited (HKG:1882), which saw its share price increase 18% in the last year, slightly above the market return of around 17% (not including dividends). In contrast, the longer term returns are negative, since the share price is 3.4% lower than it was three years ago.

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.

See our latest analysis for Haitian International Holdings

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 flawed but reasonable way to assess how sentiment around a company has changed is to compare the earnings per share (EPS) with the share price.

During the last year Haitian International Holdings grew its earnings per share (EPS) by 20%. We note that the earnings per share growth isn't far from the share price growth (of 18%). So this implies that investor expectations of the company have remained pretty steady. It makes intuitive sense that the share price and EPS would grow at similar rates.

You can see below how EPS has changed over time (discover 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. This free interactive report on Haitian International Holdings' earnings, revenue and cash flow is a great place to start, if you want to investigate the stock further.

What About Dividends?

It is important to consider the total shareholder return, as well as the share price return, for any given stock. 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 Haitian International Holdings the TSR over the last 1 year was 21%, which is better than the share price return mentioned above. This is largely a result of its dividend payments!

A Different Perspective

Haitian International Holdings' TSR for the year was broadly in line with the market average, at 21%. That gain looks pretty satisfying, and it is even better than the five-year TSR of 5% per year. Even if the share price growth slows down from here, there's a good chance that this is business worth watching in the long term. If you would like to research Haitian International Holdings in more detail then you might want to take a look at whether insiders have been buying or selling shares in the company.

We will like Haitian International Holdings better if we see some big insider buys. While we wait, check out this free list of undervalued stocks (mostly small caps) with considerable, recent, insider buying.

Please note, the market returns quoted in this article reflect the market weighted average returns of stocks that currently trade on Hong Kong 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.