The truth is that if you invest for long enough, you're going to end up with some losing stocks. But long term Aroundtown SA (ETR:AT1) shareholders have had a particularly rough ride in the last three year. So they might be feeling emotional about the 57% share price collapse, in that time. The falls have accelerated recently, with the share price down 18% in the last three months.

With the stock having lost 4.3% in the past week, it's worth taking a look at business performance and seeing if there's any red flags.

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While markets are a powerful pricing mechanism, share prices reflect investor sentiment, not just underlying business performance. One way to examine how market sentiment has changed over time is to look at the interaction between a company's share price and its earnings per share (EPS).

Aroundtown has made a profit in the past. However, it made a loss in the last twelve months, suggesting profit may be an unreliable metric at this stage. Other metrics might give us a better handle on how its value is changing over time.

Arguably the revenue decline of 3.1% per year has people thinking Aroundtown is shrinking. After all, if revenue keeps shrinking, it may be difficult to find earnings growth in the future.

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

Aroundtown is well known by investors, and plenty of clever analysts have tried to predict the future profit levels. Given we have quite a good number of analyst forecasts, it might be well worth checking out this free chart depicting consensus estimates.

What About The Total Shareholder Return (TSR)?

We've already covered Aroundtown's share price action, but we should also mention its total shareholder return (TSR). The TSR attempts to capture the value of dividends (as if they were reinvested) as well as any spin-offs or discounted capital raisings offered to shareholders. Aroundtown's TSR of was a loss of 54% for the 3 years. That wasn't as bad as its share price return, because it has paid dividends.

A Different Perspective

It's good to see that Aroundtown has rewarded shareholders with a total shareholder return of 37% in the last twelve months. There's no doubt those recent returns are much better than the TSR loss of 7% per year over five years. This makes us a little wary, but the business might have turned around its fortunes. While it is well worth considering the different impacts that market conditions can have on the share price, there are other factors that are even more important. To that end, you should be aware of the 1 warning sign we've spotted with Aroundtown .

If you like to buy stocks alongside management, then you might just love this free list of companies. (Hint: many of them are unnoticed AND have attractive valuation).

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