Ingentec Corporation's (GTSM:4768) Stock Has Seen Strong Momentum: Does That Call For Deeper Study Of Its Financial Prospects?

Ingentec (GTSM:4768) has had a great run on the share market with its stock up by a significant 9.8% over the last week. As most would know, fundamentals are what usually guide market price movements over the long-term, so we decided to look at the company's key financial indicators today to determine if they have any role to play in the recent price movement. Specifically, we decided to study Ingentec's ROE in this article.

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 short, ROE shows the profit each dollar generates with respect to its shareholder investments.

See our latest analysis for Ingentec

How Do You Calculate Return On Equity?

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 Ingentec is:

13% = NT$62m ÷ NT$482m (Based on the trailing twelve months to June 2020).

The 'return' is the yearly profit. That means that for every NT$1 worth of shareholders' equity, the company generated NT$0.13 in profit.

Why Is ROE Important For Earnings Growth?

We have already established that ROE serves as an efficient profit-generating gauge for a company's future earnings. We now need to evaluate how much profit the company reinvests or "retains" for future growth which then gives us an idea about the growth potential of the company. 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.

Ingentec's Earnings Growth And 13% ROE

To start with, Ingentec's ROE looks acceptable. Especially when compared to the industry average of 7.7% the company's ROE looks pretty impressive. Needless to say, we are quite surprised to see that Ingentec's net income shrunk at a rate of 16% over the past five years. Based on this, we feel that there might be other reasons which haven't been discussed so far in this article that could be hampering the company's growth. These include low earnings retention or poor allocation of capital.

So, as a next step, we compared Ingentec's performance against the industry and were disappointed to discover that while the company has been shrinking its earnings, the industry has been growing its earnings at a rate of 1.0% in the same period.

Earnings growth is an important metric to consider when valuing a stock. It’s important for an investor to know whether the market has priced in the company's expected earnings growth (or decline). By doing so, they will have an idea if the stock is headed into clear blue waters or if swampy waters await. Is Ingentec fairly valued compared to other companies? These 3 valuation measures might help you decide.

Is Ingentec Using Its Retained Earnings Effectively?

When we piece together Ingentec's low three-year median payout ratio of 8.3% (where it is retaining 92% of its profits), calculated for the last three-year period, we are puzzled by the lack of growth. This typically shouldn't be the case when a company is retaining most of its earnings. It looks like there might be some other reasons to explain the lack in that respect. For example, the business could be in decline.

In addition, Ingentec only recently started paying a dividend so the management probably decided the shareholders prefer dividends even though earnings have been shrinking.

Summary

In total, it does look like Ingentec has some positive aspects to its business. Although, we are disappointed to see a lack of growth in earnings even in spite of a high ROE and and a high reinvestment rate. We believe that there might be some outside factors that could be having a negative impact on the business. While we won't completely dismiss the company, what we would do, is try to ascertain how risky the business is to make a more informed decision around the company. Our risks dashboard would have the 2 risks we have identified for Ingentec.

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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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