It might be of some concern to shareholders to see the Pinnacle Financial Partners, Inc. (NASDAQ:PNFP) share price down 26% in the last month. But that doesn’t change the fact that the returns over the last five years have been very strong. It’s fair to say most would be happy with 102% the gain in that time. So while it’s never fun to see a share price fall, it’s important to look at a longer time horizon. The more important question is whether the stock is too cheap or too expensive today.

While the stock has fallen 5.9% this week, it’s worth focusing on the longer term and seeing if the stocks historical returns have been driven by the underlying fundamentals.

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To paraphrase Benjamin Graham: Over the short term the market is a voting machine, but over the long term it’s a weighing machine. 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.

Over half a decade, Pinnacle Financial Partners managed to grow its earnings per share at 14% a year. This EPS growth is reasonably close to the 15% average annual increase in the share price. That suggests that the market sentiment around the company hasn’t changed much over that time. Indeed, it would appear the share price is reacting to the EPS.

The company’s earnings per share (over time) is depicted in the image below (click to see the exact numbers).

NasdaqGS:PNFP Earnings Per Share Growth August 2nd 2025

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. Dive deeper into the earnings by checking this interactive graph of Pinnacle Financial Partners’ 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 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. We note that for Pinnacle Financial Partners the TSR over the last 5 years was 113%, which is better than the share price return mentioned above. And there’s no prize for guessing that the dividend payments largely explain the divergence!