Is Sopra Steria Group SA's (EPA:SOP) Recent Performance Tethered To Its Attractive Financial Prospects?

Sopra Steria Group's (EPA:SOP) stock is up by 4.3% over the past week. Given that the market rewards strong financials in the long-term, we wonder if that is the case in this instance. In this article, we decided to focus on Sopra Steria Group's ROE.

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 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 Is ROE Calculated?

Return on equity 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 Sopra Steria Group is:

16% = €318m ÷ €2.0b (Based on the trailing twelve months to December 2024).

The 'return' refers to a company's earnings over the last year. One way to conceptualize this is that for each €1 of shareholders' capital it has, the company made €0.16 in profit.

Check out our latest analysis for Sopra Steria Group

What Is The Relationship Between ROE And Earnings Growth?

We have already established that ROE serves as an efficient profit-generating gauge for a company's future earnings. 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.

Sopra Steria Group's Earnings Growth And 16% ROE

At first glance, Sopra Steria Group seems to have a decent ROE. Further, the company's ROE is similar to the industry average of 15%. Consequently, this likely laid the ground for the decent growth of 17% seen over the past five years by Sopra Steria Group.

As a next step, we compared Sopra Steria Group's net income growth with the industry, and pleasingly, we found that the growth seen by the company is higher than the average industry growth of 11%.

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. By doing so, they will have an idea if the stock is headed into clear blue waters or if swampy waters await. Is SOP fairly valued? This infographic on the company's intrinsic value has everything you need to know.

Is Sopra Steria Group Efficiently Re-investing Its Profits?

Sopra Steria Group has a three-year median payout ratio of 33%, which implies that it retains the remaining 67% of its profits. This suggests that its dividend is well covered, and given the decent growth seen by the company, it looks like management is reinvesting its earnings efficiently.

Moreover, Sopra Steria Group is determined to keep sharing its profits with shareholders which we infer from its long history of paying a dividend for at least ten years. Upon studying the latest analysts' consensus data, we found that the company is expected to keep paying out approximately 29% of its profits over the next three years. Therefore, the company's future ROE is also not expected to change by much with analysts predicting an ROE of 17%.

Conclusion

In total, we are pretty happy with Sopra Steria Group's performance. Particularly, we like that the company is reinvesting heavily into its business, and at a high rate of return. Unsurprisingly, this has led to an impressive earnings growth. That being so, a study of the latest analyst forecasts show that the company is expected to see a slowdown in its future earnings growth. 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.