FRoSTA Aktiengesellschaft's (FRA:NLM) Stock Has Been Sliding But Fundamentals Look Strong: Is The Market Wrong?

With its stock down 8.5% over the past month, it is easy to disregard FRoSTA (FRA:NLM). But if you pay close attention, you might gather that its strong financials could mean that the stock could potentially see an increase in value in the long-term, given how markets usually reward companies with good financial health. Specifically, we decided to study FRoSTA's ROE in this article.

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.

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How Do You Calculate Return On Equity?

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 FRoSTA is:

17% = €44m ÷ €262m (Based on the trailing twelve months to June 2025).

The 'return' is the profit over the last twelve months. Another way to think of that is that for every €1 worth of equity, the company was able to earn €0.17 in profit.

Check out our latest analysis for FRoSTA

Why Is ROE Important For 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 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.

FRoSTA's Earnings Growth And 17% ROE

To begin with, FRoSTA seems to have a respectable ROE. Especially when compared to the industry average of 10% the company's ROE looks pretty impressive. This certainly adds some context to FRoSTA's decent 14% net income growth seen over the past five years.

As a next step, we compared FRoSTA's net income growth with the industry and found that the company has a similar growth figure when compared with the industry average growth rate of 17% in the same period.

The basis for attaching value to a company is, to a great extent, tied to its earnings growth. The investor should try to establish if the expected growth or decline in earnings, whichever the case may be, is priced in. This then helps them determine if the stock is placed for a bright or bleak future. 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 FRoSTA is trading on a high P/E or a low P/E, relative to its industry.

Is FRoSTA Efficiently Re-investing Its Profits?

FRoSTA has a healthy combination of a moderate three-year median payout ratio of 39% (or a retention ratio of 61%) and a respectable amount of growth in earnings as we saw above, meaning that the company has been making efficient use of its profits.

Besides, FRoSTA 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 is expected to keep paying out approximately 37% of its profits over the next three years. Accordingly, forecasts suggest that FRoSTA's future ROE will be 15% which is again, similar to the current ROE.

Conclusion

Overall, we are quite pleased with FRoSTA's performance. In particular, it's great to see that the company is investing heavily into its business and along with a high rate of return, that has resulted in a sizeable growth in its earnings. With that said, the latest industry analyst forecasts reveal that the company's earnings growth is expected to slow down. 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.

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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.