Can Mixed Fundamentals Have A Negative Impact on Alliance Pharma plc (LON:APH) Current Share Price Momentum?

Simply Wall St

Sat, Mar 26, 2022, 8:14 AM 4 min read

Most readers would already be aware that Alliance Pharma's (LON:APH) stock increased significantly by 16% over the past month. But the company's key financial indicators appear to be differing across the board and that makes us question whether or not the company's current share price momentum can be maintained. In this article, we decided to focus on Alliance Pharma's ROE.

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 simpler terms, it measures the profitability of a company in relation to shareholder's equity.

Check out our latest analysis for Alliance Pharma

How Is ROE Calculated?

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 Alliance Pharma is:

2.6% = UK£7.3m ÷ UK£282m (Based on the trailing twelve months to December 2021).

The 'return' is the yearly profit. That means that for every £1 worth of shareholders' equity, the company generated £0.03 in profit.

Why Is ROE Important For 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. 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.

Alliance Pharma's Earnings Growth And 2.6% ROE

It is quite clear that Alliance Pharma's ROE is rather low. Not just that, even compared to the industry average of 12%, the company's ROE is entirely unremarkable. Given the circumstances, the significant decline in net income by 15% seen by Alliance Pharma over the last five years is not surprising. We believe that there also might be other aspects that are negatively influencing the company's earnings prospects. For instance, the company has a very high payout ratio, or is faced with competitive pressures.

Next, when we compared with the industry, which has shrunk its earnings at a rate of 10% in the same period, we still found Alliance Pharma's performance to be quite bleak, because the company has been shrinking its earnings faster than the industry.

past-earnings-growth — AIM:APH Past Earnings Growth March 26th 2022

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. Doing so will help them establish if the stock's future looks promising or ominous. What is APH worth today? The intrinsic value infographic in our free research report helps visualize whether APH is currently mispriced by the market.

Is Alliance Pharma Using Its Retained Earnings Effectively?

In spite of a normal three-year median payout ratio of 40% (that is, a retention ratio of 60%), the fact that Alliance Pharma's earnings have shrunk is quite puzzling. 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, Alliance Pharma has been paying dividends over a period of at least ten years suggesting that keeping up dividend payments is way more important to the management even if it comes at the cost of business growth. Upon studying the latest analysts' consensus data, we found that the company's future payout ratio is expected to drop to 25% over the next three years. As a result, the expected drop in Alliance Pharma's payout ratio explains the anticipated rise in the company's future ROE to 12%, over the same period.

Conclusion

On the whole, we feel that the performance shown by Alliance Pharma can be open to many interpretations. While the company does have a high rate of profit retention, its low rate of return is probably hampering its earnings growth. Having said that, looking at current analyst estimates, we found that the company's earnings growth rate is expected to see a huge improvement. 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.