Stock Analysis

Estimating The Intrinsic Value Of Hill & Smith PLC (LON:HILS)

Published
LSE:HILS

Key Insights

  • The projected fair value for Hill & Smith is UK£19.32 based on 2 Stage Free Cash Flow to Equity
  • Current share price of UK£20.25 suggests Hill & Smith is potentially trading close to its fair value
  • Analyst price target for HILS is UK£23.98, which is 24% above our fair value estimate

How far off is Hill & Smith PLC (LON:HILS) from its intrinsic value? Using the most recent financial data, we'll take a look at whether the stock is fairly priced by taking the expected future cash flows and discounting them to today's value. We will use the Discounted Cash Flow (DCF) model on this occasion. There's really not all that much to it, even though it might appear quite complex.

Companies can be valued in a lot of ways, so we would point out that a DCF is not perfect for every situation. For those who are keen learners of equity analysis, the Simply Wall St analysis model here may be something of interest to you.

Check out our latest analysis for Hill & Smith

Step By Step Through The Calculation

We're using the 2-stage growth model, which simply means we take in account two stages of company's growth. In the initial period the company may have a higher growth rate and the second stage is usually assumed to have a stable growth rate. To start off with, we need to estimate the next ten years of cash flows. Where possible we use analyst estimates, but when these aren't available we extrapolate the previous free cash flow (FCF) from the last estimate or reported value. We assume companies with shrinking free cash flow will slow their rate of shrinkage, and that companies with growing free cash flow will see their growth rate slow, over this period. We do this to reflect that growth tends to slow more in the early years than it does in later years.

Generally we assume that a dollar today is more valuable than a dollar in the future, so we discount the value of these future cash flows to their estimated value in today's dollars:

10-year free cash flow (FCF) forecast

2025 2026 2027 2028 2029 2030 2031 2032 2033 2034
Levered FCF (£, Millions) UK£88.5m UK£95.1m UK£94.1m UK£94.0m UK£94.4m UK£95.3m UK£96.5m UK£97.8m UK£99.4m UK£101.1m
Growth Rate Estimate Source Analyst x5 Analyst x4 Est @ -1.04% Est @ -0.15% Est @ 0.47% Est @ 0.91% Est @ 1.22% Est @ 1.43% Est @ 1.58% Est @ 1.69%
Present Value (£, Millions) Discounted @ 7.5% UK£82.3 UK£82.3 UK£75.8 UK£70.4 UK£65.8 UK£61.8 UK£58.2 UK£54.9 UK£51.9 UK£49.1

("Est" = FCF growth rate estimated by Simply Wall St)
Present Value of 10-year Cash Flow (PVCF) = UK£652m

The second stage is also known as Terminal Value, this is the business's cash flow after the first stage. For a number of reasons a very conservative growth rate is used that cannot exceed that of a country's GDP growth. In this case we have used the 5-year average of the 10-year government bond yield (1.9%) to estimate future growth. In the same way as with the 10-year 'growth' period, we discount future cash flows to today's value, using a cost of equity of 7.5%.

Terminal Value (TV)= FCF2034 × (1 + g) ÷ (r – g) = UK£101m× (1 + 1.9%) ÷ (7.5%– 1.9%) = UK£1.9b

Present Value of Terminal Value (PVTV)= TV / (1 + r)10= UK£1.9b÷ ( 1 + 7.5%)10= UK£899m

The total value, or equity value, is then the sum of the present value of the future cash flows, which in this case is UK£1.6b. In the final step we divide the equity value by the number of shares outstanding. Relative to the current share price of UK£20.3, the company appears around fair value at the time of writing. Remember though, that this is just an approximate valuation, and like any complex formula - garbage in, garbage out.

LSE:HILS Discounted Cash Flow October 18th 2024

The Assumptions

We would point out that the most important inputs to a discounted cash flow are the discount rate and of course the actual cash flows. If you don't agree with these result, have a go at the calculation yourself and play with the assumptions. The DCF also does not consider the possible cyclicality of an industry, or a company's future capital requirements, so it does not give a full picture of a company's potential performance. Given that we are looking at Hill & Smith as potential shareholders, the cost of equity is used as the discount rate, rather than the cost of capital (or weighted average cost of capital, WACC) which accounts for debt. In this calculation we've used 7.5%, which is based on a levered beta of 1.147. Beta is a measure of a stock's volatility, compared to the market as a whole. We get our beta from the industry average beta of globally comparable companies, with an imposed limit between 0.8 and 2.0, which is a reasonable range for a stable business.

SWOT Analysis for Hill & Smith

Strength
  • Earnings growth over the past year exceeded the industry.
  • Debt is not viewed as a risk.
  • Dividends are covered by earnings and cash flows.
Weakness
  • Dividend is low compared to the top 25% of dividend payers in the Metals and Mining market.
  • Expensive based on P/E ratio and estimated fair value.
Opportunity
  • Annual revenue is forecast to grow faster than the British market.
  • Significant insider buying over the past 3 months.
Threat
  • Annual earnings are forecast to grow slower than the British market.

Moving On:

Valuation is only one side of the coin in terms of building your investment thesis, and it ideally won't be the sole piece of analysis you scrutinize for a company. The DCF model is not a perfect stock valuation tool. Instead the best use for a DCF model is to test certain assumptions and theories to see if they would lead to the company being undervalued or overvalued. For instance, if the terminal value growth rate is adjusted slightly, it can dramatically alter the overall result. For Hill & Smith, we've compiled three fundamental items you should explore:

  1. Risks: As an example, we've found 1 warning sign for Hill & Smith that you need to consider before investing here.
  2. Management:Have insiders been ramping up their shares to take advantage of the market's sentiment for HILS's future outlook? Check out our management and board analysis with insights on CEO compensation and governance factors.
  3. Other High Quality Alternatives: Do you like a good all-rounder? 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 updates its DCF calculation for every British stock every day, so if you want to find the intrinsic value of any other stock just search here.

Valuation is complex, but we're here to simplify it.

Discover if Hill & Smith might be undervalued or overvalued with our detailed analysis, featuring fair value estimates, potential risks, dividends, insider trades, and its financial condition.

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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.