Is Ester Industries Limited's (NSE:ESTER) Stock's Recent Performance Being Led By Its Attractive Financial Prospects?

Most readers would already be aware that Ester Industries' (NSE:ESTER) stock increased significantly by 30% over the past three months. Since the market usually pay for a company’s long-term fundamentals, we decided to study the company’s key performance indicators to see if they could be influencing the market. Specifically, we decided to study Ester Industries' ROE in this article.

Return on Equity or ROE is a test of how effectively a company is growing its value and managing investors’ money. Put another way, it reveals the company's success at turning shareholder investments into profits.

Check out our latest analysis for Ester Industries

How Do You Calculate Return On Equity?

The formula for ROE is:

Return on Equity = Net Profit (from continuing operations) ÷ Shareholders' Equity

So, based on the above formula, the ROE for Ester Industries is:

28% = ₹1.3b ÷ ₹4.6b (Based on the trailing twelve months to September 2020).

The 'return' is the income the business earned over the last year. One way to conceptualize this is that for each ₹1 of shareholders' capital it has, the company made ₹0.28 in profit.

What Has ROE Got To Do With 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 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.

Ester Industries' Earnings Growth And 28% ROE

To begin with, Ester Industries has a pretty high ROE which is interesting. Second, a comparison with the average ROE reported by the industry of 12% also doesn't go unnoticed by us. As a result, Ester Industries' exceptional 78% net income growth seen over the past five years, doesn't come as a surprise.

As a next step, we compared Ester Industries' 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 15%.

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. If you're wondering about Ester Industries''s valuation, check out this gauge of its price-to-earnings ratio, as compared to its industry.

Is Ester Industries Using Its Retained Earnings Effectively?

Ester Industries' three-year median payout ratio to shareholders is 17%, which is quite low. This implies that the company is retaining 83% of its profits. This suggests that the management is reinvesting most of the profits to grow the business as evidenced by the growth seen by the company.

Additionally, Ester Industries has paid dividends over a period of at least ten years which means that the company is pretty serious about sharing its profits with shareholders.

Summary

On the whole, we feel that Ester Industries' performance has been quite good. 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. If the company continues to grow its earnings the way it has, that could have a positive impact on its share price given how earnings per share influence long-term share prices. Let's not forget, business risk is also one of the factors that affects the price of the stock. So this is also an important area that investors need to pay attention to before making a decision on any business. To know the 2 risks we have identified for Ester Industries visit our risks dashboard for free.

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This article by Simply Wall St is general in nature. 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.
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