Yahoo Finance Has Advanced Energy Industries, Inc.'s (NASDAQ:AEIS) Impressive Stock Performance Got Anything to Do With Its Fundamentals?
Most readers would already be aware that Advanced Energy Industries' (NASDAQ:AEIS) stock increased significantly by 7.8% over the past month. Given that stock prices are usually aligned with a company's financial performance in the long-term, we decided to study its financial indicators more closely to see if they had a hand to play in the recent price move. Particularly, we will be paying attention to Advanced Energy Industries' ROE today.
Return on equity or ROE is an important factor to be considered by a shareholder because it tells them how effectively their capital is being reinvested. In other words, it is a profitability ratio which measures the rate of return on the capital provided by the company's shareholders.
View our latest analysis for Advanced Energy Industries
How To Calculate Return On Equity?
The formula for ROE is:
Return on Equity = Net Profit (from continuing operations) ÷ Shareholders' Equity
So, based on the above formula, the ROE for Advanced Energy Industries is:
20% = US$196m ÷ US$990m (Based on the trailing twelve months to September 2022).
The 'return' is the yearly profit. That means that for every $1 worth of shareholders' equity, the company generated $0.20 in profit.
Why Is ROE Important For Earnings Growth?
We have already established that ROE serves as an efficient profit-generating gauge for a company's future earnings. We now need to evaluate how much profit the company reinvests or "retains" for future growth which then gives us an idea about the growth potential of the company. Assuming all else is equal, companies that have both a higher return on equity and higher profit retention are usually the ones that have a higher growth rate when compared to companies that don't have the same features.
Advanced Energy Industries' Earnings Growth And 20% ROE
To start with, Advanced Energy Industries' ROE looks acceptable. Further, the company's ROE compares quite favorably to the industry average of 14%. However, we are curious as to how the high returns still resulted in flat growth for Advanced Energy Industries in the past five years. We reckon that there could be some other factors at play here that's limiting the company's growth. Such as, the company pays out a huge portion of its earnings as dividends, or is faced with competitive pressures.
We then compared Advanced Energy Industries' net income growth with the industry and found that the company's growth figure is lower than the average industry growth rate of 18% in the same period, which is a bit concerning.
The basis for attaching value to a company is, to a great extent, tied to its earnings growth. The investor should try to establish if the expected growth or decline in earnings, whichever the case may be, is priced in. This then helps them determine if the stock is placed for a bright or bleak future. Has the market priced in the future outlook for AEIS? You can find out in our latest intrinsic value infographic research report.
Is Advanced Energy Industries Using Its Retained Earnings Effectively?
Advanced Energy Industries' low three-year median payout ratio of 8.4% (implying that the company keeps92% of its income) should mean that the company is retaining most of its earnings to fuel its growth and this should be reflected in its growth number, but that's not the case.
In addition, Advanced Energy Industries only recently started paying a dividend so the management must have decided the shareholders prefer dividends over earnings growth.
Summary
Overall, we feel that Advanced Energy Industries certainly does have some positive factors to consider. Although, we are disappointed to see a lack of growth in earnings even in spite of a high ROE and and a high reinvestment rate. We believe that there might be some outside factors that could be having a negative impact on the business. Having said that, on studying current analyst estimates, we were concerned to see that while the company has grown its earnings in the past, analysts expect its earnings to shrink in the future. Are these analysts expectations based on the broad expectations for the industry, or on the company's fundamentals? Click here to be taken to our analyst's forecasts page for the company.
Have feedback on this article? Concerned about the content? Get in touch with us directly. Alternatively, email editorial-team (at) simplywallst.com.
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.
Join A Paid User Research Session
You’ll receive a US$30 Amazon Gift card for 1 hour of your time while helping us build better investing tools for the individual investors like yourself. Sign up here
