Zuming Bean Products Corp.'s (SZSE:003030) Financials Are Too Obscure To Link With Current Share Price Momentum: What's In Store For the Stock?

Zuming Bean Products (SZSE:003030) has had a great run on the share market with its stock up by a significant 13% over the last month. However, we wonder if the company's inconsistent financials would have any adverse impact on the current share price momentum. Particularly, we will be paying attention to Zuming Bean Products' 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. Put another way, it reveals the company's success at turning shareholder investments into profits.

See our latest analysis for Zuming Bean Products

How Is ROE Calculated?

The formula for return on equity is:

Return on Equity = Net Profit (from continuing operations) ÷ Shareholders' Equity

So, based on the above formula, the ROE for Zuming Bean Products is:

3.2% = CN¥34m ÷ CN¥1.1b (Based on the trailing twelve months to September 2023).

The 'return' is the profit over the last twelve months. So, this means that for every CN¥1 of its shareholder's investments, the company generates a profit of CN¥0.03.

What Is The Relationship Between ROE And Earnings Growth?

Thus far, we have learned that ROE measures how efficiently a company is generating its profits. Based on how much of its profits the company chooses to reinvest or "retain", we are then able to evaluate a company's future ability to generate profits. 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.

Zuming Bean Products' Earnings Growth And 3.2% ROE

It is quite clear that Zuming Bean Products' ROE is rather low. Even compared to the average industry ROE of 8.0%, the company's ROE is quite dismal. For this reason, Zuming Bean Products' five year net income decline of 14% is not surprising given its lower ROE. We reckon that there could also be other factors at play here. For instance, the company has a very high payout ratio, or is faced with competitive pressures.

However, when we compared Zuming Bean Products' growth with the industry we found that while the company's earnings have been shrinking, the industry has seen an earnings growth of 1.6% in the same period. This is quite worrisome.

Earnings growth is an important metric to consider when valuing a stock. 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. If you're wondering about Zuming Bean Products''s valuation, check out this gauge of its price-to-earnings ratio, as compared to its industry.

Is Zuming Bean Products Using Its Retained Earnings Effectively?

Looking at its three-year median payout ratio of 37% (or a retention ratio of 63%) which is pretty normal, Zuming Bean Products' declining earnings is rather baffling as one would expect to see a fair bit of growth when a company is retaining a good portion of its profits. So there could be some other explanations in that regard. For instance, the company's business may be deteriorating.

Moreover, Zuming Bean Products has been paying dividends for three years, which is a considerable amount of time, suggesting that management must have perceived that the shareholders prefer consistent dividends even though earnings have been shrinking.

Summary

On the whole, we feel that the performance shown by Zuming Bean Products can be open to many interpretations. While the company does have a high rate of reinvestment, the low ROE means that all that reinvestment is not reaping any benefit to its investors, and moreover, its having a negative impact on the earnings growth. Wrapping up, we would proceed with caution with this company and one way of doing that would be to look at the risk profile of the business. To know the 2 risks we have identified for Zuming Bean Products visit our risks dashboard for free.

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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.