The calculation
We are going to use a two-stage DCF model, which, as the name states, takes into account two stages of growth. The first stage is generally a higher growth period which levels off heading towards the terminal value, captured in the second ‘steady growth’ period. In the first stage we need to estimate the cash flows to the business over the next five years. For this I used the consensus of the analysts covering the stock, as you can see below. The sum of these cash flows is then discounted to today’s value.
5-year cash flow estimate
| 2018 | 2019 | 2020 | 2021 | 2022 | |
| Levered FCF (£, Millions) | £10.45 | £25.64 | £29.87 | £33.35 | £35.80 |
| Source | Analyst x2 | Analyst x4 | Analyst x4 | Analyst x2 | Analyst x1 |
| Present Value Discounted @ 8.28% | £9.65 | £21.87 | £23.53 | £24.26 | £24.05 |
Present Value of 5-year Cash Flow (PVCF)= UK£103.36m
We now need to calculate the Terminal Value, which accounts for all the future cash flows after the five years. For a number of reasons a very conservative growth rate is used that cannot exceed that of the GDP. In this case I have used the 10-year government bond rate (1.4%). In the same way as with the 5-year ‘growth’ period, we discount this to today’s value at a cost of equity of 8.3%.
Terminal Value (TV) = FCF2022 × (1 + g) ÷ (r – g) = UK£35.80m × (1 + 1.4%) ÷ (8.3% – 1.4%) = UK£527.43m
Present Value of Terminal Value (PVTV) = TV / (1 + r)5 = UK£527.43m ÷ ( 1 + 8.3%)5 = UK£354.36m
The total value, or equity value, is then the sum of the present value of the cash flows, which in this case is UK£457.72m. In the final step we divide the equity value by the number of shares outstanding. If the stock is an depositary receipt (represents a specified number of shares in a foreign corporation) or ADR then we use the equivalent number. This results in an intrinsic value of £2.51. Relative to the current share price of £1.33, the stock is quite good value at a 46.95% discount to what it is available for right now.
The assumptions
Now the most important inputs to a discounted cash flow are the discount rate, and of course, the actual cash flows. You don’t have to agree with my inputs, I recommend redoing the calculations yourself and playing with them. Because we are looking at McBride as potential shareholders, the cost of equity is used as the discount rate, rather than the cost of capital (or weighed average cost of capital, WACC) which accounts for debt. In this calculation I’ve used 8.3%, which is based on a levered beta of 0.800. This is derived from the Bottom-Up Beta method based on comparable companies, with an imposed limit between 0.8 and 2.0, which is a reasonable range for a stable business.
Next Steps:
Although the valuation of a company is important, it shouldn’t be the only metric you look at when researching a company. What is the reason for the share price to differ from the intrinsic value? For MCB, there are three key factors you should look at:
- Financial Health: Does MCB have a healthy balance sheet? Take a look at our free balance sheet analysis with six simple checks on key factors like leverage and risk.
- Future Earnings: How does MCB’s growth rate compare to its peers and the wider market? Dig deeper into the analyst consensus number for the upcoming years by interacting with our free analyst growth expectation chart.
- Other High Quality Alternatives: Are there other high quality stocks you could be holding instead of MCB? Explore our interactive list of high quality stocks to get an idea of what else is out there you may be missing!
PS. Simply Wall St does a DCF calculation for every GB stock every 6 hours, so if you want to find the intrinsic value of any other stock just search here.