Should Weakness in Acer Cyber Security Inc.'s (GTSM:6690) Stock Be Seen As A Sign That Market Will Correct The Share Price Given Decent Financials?

Acer Cyber Security (GTSM:6690) has had a rough three months with its share price down 17%. However, stock prices are usually driven by a company’s financials over the long term, which in this case look pretty respectable. Specifically, we decided to study Acer Cyber Security's ROE in this article.

Return on equity or ROE is an important factor to be considered by a shareholder because it tells them how effectively their capital is being reinvested. In short, ROE shows the profit each dollar generates with respect to its shareholder investments.

See our latest analysis for Acer Cyber Security

How To Calculate Return On Equity?

ROE 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 Acer Cyber Security is:

12% = NT$73m ÷ NT$587m (Based on the trailing twelve months to September 2020).

The 'return' refers to a company's earnings over the last year. So, this means that for every NT$1 of its shareholder's investments, the company generates a profit of NT$0.12.

What Has ROE Got To Do With Earnings Growth?

So far, we've learned that ROE is a measure of a company's profitability. 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. Generally speaking, other things being equal, firms with a high return on equity and profit retention, have a higher growth rate than firms that don’t share these attributes.

A Side By Side comparison of Acer Cyber Security's Earnings Growth And 12% ROE

At first glance, Acer Cyber Security seems to have a decent ROE. Further, the company's ROE is similar to the industry average of 15%. Given the circumstances, we can't help but wonder why Acer Cyber Security saw little to no growth in the past five years. We reckon that there could be some other factors at play here that's limiting the company's growth. Such as, the company pays out a huge portion of its earnings as dividends, or is faced with competitive pressures.

As a next step, we compared Acer Cyber Security's net income growth with the industry and were disappointed to see that the company's growth is lower than the industry average growth of 14% in the same period.

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. One good indicator of expected earnings growth is the P/E ratio which determines the price the market is willing to pay for a stock based on its earnings prospects. So, you may want to check if Acer Cyber Security is trading on a high P/E or a low P/E, relative to its industry.

Is Acer Cyber Security Efficiently Re-investing Its Profits?

With a high three-year median payout ratio of 62% (implying that the company keeps only 38% of its income) of its business to reinvest into its business), most of Acer Cyber Security's profits are being paid to shareholders, which explains the absence of growth in earnings.

In addition, Acer Cyber Security only recently started paying a dividend so the management must have decided the shareholders prefer dividends over earnings growth.

Summary

On the whole, we do feel that Acer Cyber Security has some positive attributes. Yet, the low earnings growth is a bit concerning, especially given that the company has a high rate of return. Investors could have benefitted from the high ROE, had the company been reinvesting more of its earnings. As discussed earlier, the company is retaining a small portion of its profits. Until now, we have only just grazed the surface of the company's past performance by looking at the company's fundamentals. So it may be worth checking this free detailed graph of Acer Cyber Security's past earnings, as well as revenue and cash flows to get a deeper insight into the company's performance.

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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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