The Reject Shop Limited (ASX:TRS) Stock Is Going Strong But Fundamentals Look Uncertain: What Lies Ahead ?
Reject Shop (ASX:TRS) has had a great run on the share market with its stock up by a significant 10% over the last three months. However, we decided to pay attention to the company’s fundamentals which don’t appear to give a clear sign about the company’s financial health. Specifically, we decided to study Reject Shop’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 other words, it is a profitability ratio which measures the rate of return on the capital provided by the company’s shareholders.
See our latest analysis for Reject Shop
How Do You Calculate Return On Equity?
The formula for return on equity is:
Return on Equity = Net Profit (from continuing operations) ÷ Shareholders’ Equity
So, based on the above formula, the ROE for Reject Shop is:
4.8% = AU$8.8m ÷ AU$186m (Based on the trailing twelve months to January 2023).
The ‘return’ is the yearly profit. One way to conceptualize this is that for each A$1 of shareholders’ capital it has, the company made A$0.05 in profit.
What Has ROE Got To Do With Earnings Growth?
Thus far, we have learned that ROE measures how efficiently a company is generating its profits. 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. 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.
Reject Shop’s Earnings Growth And 4.8% ROE
At first glance, Reject Shop’s ROE doesn’t look very promising. We then compared the company’s ROE to the broader industry and were disappointed to see that the ROE is lower than the industry average of 17%. As a result, Reject Shop reported a very low income growth of 4.4% over the past five years.
As a next step, we compared Reject Shop’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 16% in the same period.
The basis for attaching value to a company is, to a great extent, tied to its earnings growth. What investors need to determine next is if the expected earnings growth, or the lack of it, is already built into the share price. By doing so, they will have an idea if the stock is headed into clear blue waters or if swampy waters await. Is Reject Shop fairly valued compared to other companies? These 3 valuation measures might help you decide.
Is Reject Shop Using Its Retained Earnings Effectively?
Reject Shop doesn’t pay any dividend currently which essentially means that it has been reinvesting all of its profits into the business. This doesn’t explain the low earnings growth number that we discussed above. So there could be some other explanation in that regard. For instance, the company’s business may be deteriorating.
Summary
In total, we’re a bit ambivalent about Reject Shop’s performance. While the company does have a high rate of reinvestment, the low ROE means that all that reinvestment is not reaping any benefit to its investors, and moreover, its having a negative impact on the earnings growth. Having said that, looking at the current analyst estimates, we found that the company’s earnings are expected to gain momentum. Are these analysts expectations based on the broad expectations for the industry, or on the company’s fundamentals? Click here to be taken to our analyst’s forecasts page for the company.
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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.
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