Yahoo Finance Should Weakness in Dewhurst plc's (LON:DWHT) Stock Be Seen As A Sign That Market Will Correct The Share Price Given Decent Financials?
It is hard to get excited after looking at Dewhurst's (LON:DWHT) recent performance, when its stock has declined 12% over the past month. However, the company's fundamentals look pretty decent, and long-term financials are usually aligned with future market price movements. Particularly, we will be paying attention to Dewhurst's ROE today.
Return on equity or ROE is a key measure used to assess how efficiently a company's management is utilizing the company's capital. In short, ROE shows the profit each dollar generates with respect to its shareholder investments.
Check out our latest analysis for Dewhurst
How To 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 Dewhurst is:
11% = UK£5.1m ÷ UK£47m (Based on the trailing twelve months to March 2021).
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 £0.11 in profit.
What Is The Relationship Between ROE And Earnings Growth?
So far, we've learned that ROE is a measure of a company's profitability. 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.
A Side By Side comparison of Dewhurst's Earnings Growth And 11% ROE
To start with, Dewhurst's ROE looks acceptable. Further, the company's ROE is similar to the industry average of 11%. Despite this, Dewhurst's 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. For example, it could be that the company has a high payout ratio or the business has allocated capital poorly, for instance.
As a next step, we compared Dewhurst's net income growth with the industry and discovered that the industry saw an average growth of 5.5% in the same period.
The basis for attaching value to a company is, to a great extent, tied to its earnings growth. It’s important for an investor to know whether the market has priced in the company's expected earnings growth (or decline). Doing so will help them establish if the stock's future looks promising or ominous. Is Dewhurst fairly valued compared to other companies? These 3 valuation measures might help you decide.
Is Dewhurst Efficiently Re-investing Its Profits?
Despite having a normal three-year median payout ratio of 31% (implying that the company keeps 69% of its income) over the last three years, Dewhurst has seen a negligible amount of growth in earnings as we saw above. Therefore, there might be some other reasons to explain the lack in that respect. For example, the business could be in decline.
Additionally, Dewhurst has paid dividends over a period of at least ten years, which means that the company's management is determined to pay dividends even if it means little to no earnings growth.
Summary
In total, it does look like Dewhurst has some positive aspects to its business. 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. So far, we've only made a quick discussion around the company's earnings growth. So it may be worth checking this free detailed graph of Dewhurst's past earnings, as well as revenue and cash flows to get a deeper insight into the company's performance.
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.
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