The simplest way to invest in stocks is to buy exchange traded funds. But investors can boost returns by picking market-beating companies to own shares in. To wit, the United Security Bancshares (NASDAQ:UBFO) share price is 28% higher than it was a year ago, much better than the market return of around 18% (not including dividends) in the same period. That's a solid performance by our standards! However, the longer term returns haven't been so impressive, with the stock up just 16% in the last three years.

Now it's worth having a look at the company's fundamentals too, because that will help us determine if the long term shareholder return has matched the performance of the underlying business.

See our latest analysis for United Security Bancshares

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).

During the last year, United Security Bancshares actually saw its earnings per share drop 26%.

So we don't think that investors are paying too much attention to EPS. Since the change in EPS doesn't seem to correlate with the change in share price, it's worth taking a look at other metrics.

Absent any improvement, we don't think a thirst for dividends is pushing up the United Security Bancshares' share price. It saw it's revenue decline by 9.0% over twelve months. It's fair to say we're a little surprised to see the share price up, and that makes us cautious.

The company's revenue and earnings (over time) are depicted in the image below (click to see the exact numbers).

We like that insiders have been buying shares in the last twelve months. Having said that, most people consider earnings and revenue growth trends to be a more meaningful guide to the business. Dive deeper into the earnings by checking this interactive graph of United Security Bancshares' earnings, revenue and cash flow.

What About Dividends?

When looking at investment returns, it is important to consider the difference between total shareholder return (TSR) and share price return. The TSR incorporates the value of any spin-offs or discounted capital raisings, along with any dividends, based on the assumption that the dividends are reinvested. It's fair to say that the TSR gives a more complete picture for stocks that pay a dividend. In the case of United Security Bancshares, it has a TSR of 36% for the last 1 year. That exceeds its share price return that we previously mentioned. And there's no prize for guessing that the dividend payments largely explain the divergence!