Did You Miss Sistema Financial's (MCX:AFKS) Impressive 134% Share Price Gain?

The most you can lose on any stock (assuming you don't use leverage) is 100% of your money. But in contrast you can make much more than 100% if the company does well. To wit, the Sistema Public Joint Stock Financial Corporation (MCX:AFKS) share price has flown 134% in the last three years. How nice for those who held the stock! Also pleasing for shareholders was the 22% gain in the last three months. But this move may well have been assisted by the reasonably buoyant market (up 19% in 90 days).

View our latest analysis for Sistema Financial

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.

We know that Sistema Financial has been profitable in the past. However, it made a loss in the last twelve months, suggesting profit may be an unreliable metric at this stage. So we might find other metrics can better explain the share price movements.

Languishing at just 0.4%, we doubt the dividend is doing much to prop up the share price. The revenue drop of 3.4% is as underwhelming as some politicians. The only thing that's clear is there is low correlation between Sistema Financial's share price and its historic fundamental data. Further research may be required!

You can see how earnings and revenue have changed over time in the image below (click on the chart to see the exact values).

It's good to see that there was some significant insider buying in the last three months. That's a positive. That said, we think earnings and revenue growth trends are even more important factors to consider. So it makes a lot of sense to check out what analysts think Sistema Financial will earn in the future (free profit forecasts).

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. Arguably, the TSR gives a more comprehensive picture of the return generated by a stock. As it happens, Sistema Financial's TSR for the last 3 years was 141%, 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

We're pleased to report that Sistema Financial shareholders have received a total shareholder return of 98% over one year. And that does include the dividend. Since the one-year TSR is better than the five-year TSR (the latter coming in at 16% per year), it would seem that the stock's performance has improved in recent times. In the best case scenario, this may hint at some real business momentum, implying that now could be a great time to delve deeper. It is all well and good that insiders have been buying shares, but we suggest you check here to see what price insiders were buying at.

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 RU exchanges.

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This article by Simply Wall St is general in nature. 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.
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