It's nice to see the Lifestyle Communities Limited (ASX:LIC) share price up 11% in a week. Meanwhile over the last three years the stock has dropped hard. In that time, the share price dropped 62%. So it's good to see it climbing back up. The rise has some hopeful, but turnarounds are often precarious.

On a more encouraging note the company has added AU$101m to its market cap in just the last 7 days, so let's see if we can determine what's driven the three-year loss for shareholders.

Check out our latest analysis for Lifestyle Communities

To paraphrase Benjamin Graham: Over the short term the market is a voting machine, but over the long term it's a weighing machine. By comparing earnings per share (EPS) and share price changes over time, we can get a feel for how investor attitudes to a company have morphed over time.

During the three years that the share price fell, Lifestyle Communities' earnings per share (EPS) dropped by 22% each year. This change in EPS is reasonably close to the 27% average annual decrease in the share price. That suggests that the market sentiment around the company hasn't changed much over that time, despite the disappointment. It seems like the share price is reflecting the declining earnings per share.

The graphic below depicts how EPS has changed over time (unveil the exact values by clicking on the image).

We like that insiders have been buying shares in the last twelve months. Even so, future earnings will be far more important to whether current shareholders make money. It might be well worthwhile taking a look at our free report on Lifestyle Communities' earnings, revenue and cash flow.

A Different Perspective

Lifestyle Communities shareholders are down 46% for the year (even including dividends), but the market itself is up 21%. 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. Longer term investors wouldn't be so upset, since they would have made 3%, each year, over five years. If the fundamental data continues to indicate long term sustainable growth, the current sell-off could be an opportunity worth considering. I find it very interesting to look at share price over the long term as a proxy for business performance. But to truly gain insight, we need to consider other information, too. Even so, be aware that Lifestyle Communities is showing 3 warning signs in our investment analysis , you should know about...

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

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