In this series, we take a look at the 25 stocks on the S&P 500 Index (SPX) that have turned in the worst performance during the past decade -- what went wrong, and what happens next.

If you live or work in Cincinnati, it's impossible to avoid Fifth Third Bancorp (NASDAQ: FITB). Branches and ATMs pop up around nearly every street corner, and, if you're downtown at lunch time, you'll see hundreds of employees from FITB's downtown headquarters flooding the sidewalks. (They're easy enough to pick out, since they're required to wear gold 5/3 insignia pins.) And please, don't get me started on the madness that is Fifth Third Day, which naturally falls on 5/3. Despite its impressive banking dominance over this Midwestern city, FITB -- to paraphrase Chris Farley -- just can't seem to get its share price on the right track.

What went wrong? At number 16 on our list of SPX laggards, FITB shed 76% of its value during the 10-year period ending June 30, 2008. If you're mentally steeling yourself for another subprime sob story, Fifth Third won't deliver. The stock has crumpled steadily since its April 2002 peak at $69.70, defiantly blazing a path lower even as the rest of the broad market enjoyed a stellar bull run.

In the late '90s and through the turn of the century, FITB grew at a pace that cancer cells would envy. From CNB Bancshares to Vanguard Financial to State Savings, the regional bank swallowed up its peers and rivals with a voracious appetite to rival Jabba the Hut's. A fine growth strategy -- if your bean-counters are all on the same page. When FITB took a $54-million charge against earnings after improperly accounting for some mortgage-backed security investments, it drew the attention of the SEC. In the meantime, the Federal Reserve Bank of Cleveland and the Ohio Department of Commerce imposed a moratorium on any further acquisitions.

That wasn't the end of FITB's "issues," though. The Justice Department filed suit against one of its Michigan banks, accusing the company of redlining, or discriminatory lending practices that gave short shrift to African-American neighborhoods. Fifth Third eventually shelled out an apology worth more than $3 million in small-business and residential loans to the Detroit area. At the same time, the bank was struggling against shrinking deposits, executive shake-ups, and a promotion-oriented sales strategy that did little to inspire customer loyalty.

And, of course, the bank's already-sluggish performance hardly insulated it from the subprime fallout. This past June, FITB confessed plans to slash its dividend by 66%, sell non-core businesses, and sell $1 billion in convertible preferred stock to shore up capital as credit losses continued to mount.

What next? FITB was bombarded with price-target cuts and downgrades following its admission of weakness in June, but more recently the stock has scored upgrades (no kidding). In fact, the shares seem remarkably well-protected from further bearish commentary; Zacks reports that 88% of analysts following the stock consider it a "hold" or "sell."

That doesn't mean the bad news has stopped rolling in. On July 22, the bank reported a second-quarter loss of $202 million, and on July 23, FITB was pummeled by news that Cincinnati Financial sold over half of its Fifth Third stake. Nevertheless, analysts at Lehman Brothers and Bernstein both boosted their price targets on the shares on July 24. Let the buyer beware, though -- the equity does have quite the bear gap to fill in, and FITB was a laggard before the subprime contagion ever hit the Street.

Elizabeth Harrow is an analyst and financial writer in the research department at Schaeffer's Investment Research. She is featured in the weekly video series Option Basics on SchaeffersResearch.com.