In order to justify the effort of selecting individual stocks, it's worth striving to beat the returns from a market index fund. But if you try your hand at stock picking, your risk returning less than the market. Unfortunately, that's been the case for longer term TriMas Corporation (NASDAQ:TRS) shareholders, since the share price is down 26% in the last three years, falling well short of the market return of around 26%. The more recent news is of little comfort, with the share price down 22% in a year.

If the past week is anything to go by, investor sentiment for TriMas isn't positive, so let's see if there's a mismatch between fundamentals and the share price.

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.

TriMas became profitable within the last five years. That would generally be considered a positive, so we are surprised to see the share price is down. So it's worth looking at other metrics to try to understand the share price move.

With a rather small yield of just 0.7% we doubt that the stock's share price is based on its dividend. We note that, in three years, revenue has actually grown at a 5.2% annual rate, so that doesn't seem to be a reason to sell shares. It's probably worth investigating TriMas further; while we may be missing something on this analysis, there might also be an opportunity.

You can see below how earnings and revenue have changed over time (discover the exact values by clicking on the image).

We know that TriMas has improved its bottom line over the last three years, but what does the future have in store? You can see how its balance sheet has strengthened (or weakened) over time in this free interactive graphic.

A Different Perspective

Investors in TriMas had a tough year, with a total loss of 21% (including dividends), against a market gain of about 27%. However, keep in mind that even the best stocks will sometimes underperform the market over a twelve month period. Regrettably, last year's performance caps off a bad run, with the shareholders facing a total loss of 4% per year over five years. Generally speaking long term share price weakness can be a bad sign, though contrarian investors might want to research the stock in hope of a turnaround. It's always interesting to track share price performance over the longer term. But to understand TriMas better, we need to consider many other factors. For example, we've discovered 1 warning sign for TriMas that you should be aware of before investing here.

If you are like me, then you will 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 American 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.