Is The Market Rewarding Shenzhen Jove Enterprise Limited (SZSE:300814) With A Negative Sentiment As A Result Of Its Mixed Fundamentals?

Shenzhen Jove Enterprise (SZSE:300814) has had a rough week with its share price down 12%. We, however decided to study the company's financials to determine if they have got anything to do with the price decline. Stock prices are usually driven by a company’s financial performance over the long term, and therefore we decided to pay more attention to the company's financial performance. Specifically, we decided to study Shenzhen Jove Enterprise's ROE in this article.

ROE or return on equity is a useful tool to assess how effectively a company can generate returns on the investment it received from its shareholders. 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 Shenzhen Jove Enterprise

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 Shenzhen Jove Enterprise is:

2.4% = CN¥28m ÷ CN¥1.2b (Based on the trailing twelve months to September 2024).

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¥0.02.

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. 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 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.

Shenzhen Jove Enterprise's Earnings Growth And 2.4% ROE

As you can see, Shenzhen Jove Enterprise's ROE looks pretty weak. Even when compared to the industry average of 6.3%, the ROE figure is pretty disappointing. Therefore, it might not be wrong to say that the five year net income decline of 23% seen by Shenzhen Jove Enterprise was possibly a result of it having a 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 Shenzhen Jove Enterprise's growth with the industry we found that while the company's earnings have been shrinking, the industry has seen an earnings growth of 3.9% in the same period. This is quite worrisome.

Earnings growth is a huge factor in stock valuation. It’s important for an investor to know whether the market has priced in the company's expected earnings growth (or decline). 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 Shenzhen Jove Enterprise's's valuation, check out this gauge of its price-to-earnings ratio, as compared to its industry.

Is Shenzhen Jove Enterprise Using Its Retained Earnings Effectively?

In spite of a normal three-year median payout ratio of 34% (that is, a retention ratio of 66%), the fact that Shenzhen Jove Enterprise's earnings have shrunk is quite puzzling. So there might be other factors at play here which could potentially be hampering growth. For example, the business has faced some headwinds.

Moreover, Shenzhen Jove Enterprise 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

In total, we're a bit ambivalent about Shenzhen Jove Enterprise's performance. 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. Our risks dashboard would have the 4 risks we have identified for Shenzhen Jove Enterprise.

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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.