Do Its Financials Have Any Role To Play In Driving Austin Engineering Limited's (ASX:ANG) Stock Up Recently?

Austin Engineering's (ASX:ANG) stock is up by a considerable 17% over the past three months. We wonder if and what role the company's financials play in that price change as a company's long-term fundamentals usually dictate market outcomes. In this article, we decided to focus on Austin Engineering's ROE.

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 simpler terms, it measures the profitability of a company in relation to shareholder's equity.

See our latest analysis for Austin Engineering

How Do You 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 Austin Engineering is:

4.6% = AU$4.5m ÷ AU$99m (Based on the trailing twelve months to June 2020).

The 'return' refers to a company's earnings over the last year. One way to conceptualize this is that for each A$1 of shareholders' capital it has, the company made A$0.05 in profit.

What Has ROE Got To Do With 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. Generally speaking, other things being equal, firms with a high return on equity and profit retention, have a higher growth rate than firms that don’t share these attributes.

Austin Engineering's Earnings Growth And 4.6% ROE

At first glance, Austin Engineering's ROE doesn't look very promising. Next, when compared to the average industry ROE of 11%, the company's ROE leaves us feeling even less enthusiastic. In spite of this, Austin Engineering was able to grow its net income considerably, at a rate of 69% in the last five years. We reckon that there could be other factors at play here. Such as - high earnings retention or an efficient management in place.

We then compared Austin Engineering's net income growth with the industry and we're pleased to see that the company's growth figure is higher when compared with the industry which has a growth rate of 35% 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. Doing so will help them establish if the stock's future looks promising or ominous. One good indicator of expected earnings growth is the P/E ratio which determines the price the market is willing to pay for a stock based on its earnings prospects. So, you may want to check if Austin Engineering is trading on a high P/E or a low P/E, relative to its industry.

Is Austin Engineering Making Efficient Use Of Its Profits?

Austin Engineering's ' three-year median payout ratio is on the lower side at 18% implying that it is retaining a higher percentage (82%) of its profits. So it looks like Austin Engineering is reinvesting profits heavily to grow its business, which shows in its earnings growth.

Besides, Austin Engineering has been paying dividends for at least ten years or more. This shows that the company is committed to sharing profits with its shareholders. Upon studying the latest analysts' consensus data, we found that the company's future payout ratio is expected to rise to 33% over the next three years. Still, forecasts suggest that Austin Engineering's future ROE will rise to 11% even though the the company's payout ratio is expected to rise. We presume that there could some other characteristics of the business that could be driving the anticipated growth in the company's ROE.

Summary

Overall, we feel that Austin Engineering certainly does have some positive factors to consider. Despite its low rate of return, the fact that the company reinvests a very high portion of its profits into its business, no doubt contributed to its high earnings growth. Having said that, the company's earnings growth is expected to slow down, as forecasted in the current analyst estimates. 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.

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This article by Simply Wall St is general in nature. 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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