Yahoo Finance Jack Henry & Associates, Inc.'s (NASDAQ:JKHY) Stock Has Shown Weakness Lately But Financial Prospects Look Decent: Is The Market Wrong?
Jack Henry & Associates (NASDAQ:JKHY) has had a rough three months with its share price down 6.5%. However, stock prices are usually driven by a company’s financials over the long term, which in this case look pretty respectable. Particularly, we will be paying attention to Jack Henry & Associates' 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.
Check out our latest analysis for Jack Henry & Associates
How Do You Calculate Return On Equity?
ROE can be calculated by using the formula:
Return on Equity = Net Profit (from continuing operations) ÷ Shareholders' Equity
So, based on the above formula, the ROE for Jack Henry & Associates is:
25% = US$367m ÷ US$1.5b (Based on the trailing twelve months to September 2022).
The 'return' is the income the business earned over the last year. That means that for every $1 worth of shareholders' equity, the company generated $0.25 in profit.
What Has ROE Got To Do With Earnings Growth?
Thus far, we have learned that ROE measures how efficiently a company is generating its profits. Depending on how much of these profits the company reinvests or "retains", and how effectively it does so, we are then able to assess a company’s earnings growth potential. Assuming everything else remains unchanged, the higher the ROE and profit retention, the higher the growth rate of a company compared to companies that don't necessarily bear these characteristics.
Jack Henry & Associates' Earnings Growth And 25% ROE
First thing first, we like that Jack Henry & Associates has an impressive ROE. Second, a comparison with the average ROE reported by the industry of 15% also doesn't go unnoticed by us. Despite this, Jack Henry & Associates' five year net income growth was quite flat over the past five years. So, there could be some other aspects that could potentially be preventing the company from growing. Such as, the company pays out a huge portion of its earnings as dividends, or is faced with competitive pressures.
As a next step, we compared Jack Henry & Associates' net income growth with the industry and were disappointed to see that the company's growth is lower than the industry average growth of 15% in the same period.
Earnings growth is a huge factor in stock valuation. What investors need to determine next is if the expected earnings growth, or the lack of it, is already built into the share price. By doing so, they will have an idea if the stock is headed into clear blue waters or if swampy waters await. If you're wondering about Jack Henry & Associates''s valuation, check out this gauge of its price-to-earnings ratio, as compared to its industry.
Is Jack Henry & Associates Efficiently Re-investing Its Profits?
Despite having a normal three-year median payout ratio of 43% (implying that the company keeps 57% of its income) over the last three years, Jack Henry & Associates has seen a negligible amount of growth in earnings as we saw above. So there might be other factors at play here which could potentially be hampering growth. For example, the business has faced some headwinds.
Moreover, Jack Henry & Associates has been paying dividends for at least ten years or more suggesting that management must have perceived that the shareholders prefer dividends over earnings growth. Our latest analyst data shows that the future payout ratio of the company over the next three years is expected to be approximately 37%. Accordingly, forecasts suggest that Jack Henry & Associates' future ROE will be 21% which is again, similar to the current ROE.
Conclusion
On the whole, we do feel that Jack Henry & Associates has some positive attributes. However, given the high ROE and high profit retention, we would expect the company to be delivering strong earnings growth, but that isn't the case here. This suggests that there might be some external threat to the business, that's hampering its growth. That being so, the latest analyst forecasts show that the company will continue to see an expansion in its earnings. To know more about the company's future earnings growth forecasts take a look at this free report on analyst forecasts for the company to find out more.
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
