Marlborough Wine Estates Group (NZSE:MWE) has had a rough month with its share price down 6.5%. However, the company's fundamentals look pretty decent, and long-term financials are usually aligned with future market price movements. Particularly, we will be paying attention to Marlborough Wine Estates Group's ROE today.
ROE or return on equity is a useful tool to assess how effectively a company can generate returns on the investment it received from its shareholders. Simply put, it is used to assess the profitability of a company in relation to its equity capital.
View our latest analysis for Marlborough Wine Estates Group
How Is ROE Calculated?
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 Marlborough Wine Estates Group is:
0.9% = NZ$295k ÷ NZ$31m (Based on the trailing twelve months to June 2023).
The 'return' is the amount earned after tax over the last twelve months. One way to conceptualize this is that for each NZ$1 of shareholders' capital it has, the company made NZ$0.01 in profit.
Why Is ROE Important For Earnings Growth?
So far, we've learned that ROE is a measure of a company's profitability. 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. 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.
Marlborough Wine Estates Group's Earnings Growth And 0.9% ROE
As you can see, Marlborough Wine Estates Group's ROE looks pretty weak. Even compared to the average industry ROE of 2.8%, the company's ROE is quite dismal. In spite of this, Marlborough Wine Estates Group was able to grow its net income considerably, at a rate of 64% in the last five years. We believe that there might be other aspects that are positively influencing the company's earnings growth. Such as - high earnings retention or an efficient management in place.
As a next step, we compared Marlborough Wine Estates Group's 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 14%.
Earnings growth is a huge factor in stock valuation. The investor should try to establish if the expected growth or decline in earnings, whichever the case may be, is priced in. By doing so, they will have an idea if the stock is headed into clear blue waters or if swampy waters await. If you're wondering about Marlborough Wine Estates Group's's valuation, check out this gauge of its price-to-earnings ratio, as compared to its industry.