Is Comet Holding AG's (VTX:COTN) Latest Stock Performance A Reflection Of Its Financial Health?

Comet Holding's (VTX:COTN) stock is up by a considerable 21% over the past month. Since the market usually pay for a company’s long-term fundamentals, we decided to study the company’s key performance indicators to see if they could be influencing the market. In this article, we decided to focus on Comet Holding'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 short, ROE shows the profit each dollar generates with respect to its shareholder investments.

View our latest analysis for Comet Holding

How To Calculate Return On Equity?

The formula for ROE is:

Return on Equity = Net Profit (from continuing operations) ÷ Shareholders' Equity

So, based on the above formula, the ROE for Comet Holding is:

22% = CHF63m ÷ CHF281m (Based on the trailing twelve months to June 2022).

The 'return' is the amount earned after tax over the last twelve months. Another way to think of that is that for every CHF1 worth of equity, the company was able to earn CHF0.22 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. 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.

Comet Holding's Earnings Growth And 22% ROE

Firstly, we acknowledge that Comet Holding has a significantly high ROE. Second, a comparison with the average ROE reported by the industry of 15% also doesn't go unnoticed by us. So, the substantial 22% net income growth seen by Comet Holding over the past five years isn't overly surprising.

As a next step, we compared Comet Holding'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 5.6%.

past-earnings-growth
past-earnings-growth

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. This then helps them determine if the stock is placed for a bright or bleak future. What is COTN worth today? The intrinsic value infographic in our free research report helps visualize whether COTN is currently mispriced by the market.

Is Comet Holding Efficiently Re-investing Its Profits?

Comet Holding has a three-year median payout ratio of 36% (where it is retaining 64% of its income) which is not too low or not too high. This suggests that its dividend is well covered, and given the high growth we discussed above, it looks like Comet Holding is reinvesting its earnings efficiently.

Moreover, Comet Holding is determined to keep sharing its profits with shareholders which we infer from its long history of paying a dividend for at least ten years. Existing analyst estimates suggest that the company's future payout ratio is expected to drop to 29% over the next three years. Regardless, the ROE is not expected to change much for the company despite the lower expected payout ratio.

Conclusion

On the whole, we feel that Comet Holding's performance has been quite good. Particularly, we like that the company is reinvesting heavily into its business, and at a high rate of return. Unsurprisingly, this has led to an impressive earnings growth. With that said, the latest industry analyst forecasts reveal that the company's earnings growth is expected to slow down. To know more about the company's future earnings growth forecasts take a look at this free report on analyst forecasts for the company to find out more.

Have feedback on this article? Concerned about the content? Get in touch with us directly. Alternatively, email editorial-team (at) simplywallst.com.

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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