Apollo Endosurgery, Inc. (NASDAQ:APEN) Investors Are Paying Above The Intrinsic Value
In this article I am going to calculate the intrinsic value of Apollo Endosurgery, Inc. (NASDAQ:APEN) by taking the expected future cash flows and discounting them to their present value. This is done using the discounted cash flows (DCF) model. Don’t get put off by the jargon, the math behind it is actually quite straightforward. Anyone interested in learning a bit more about intrinsic value should have a read of the Simply Wall St analysis model. Please also note that this article was written in January 2019 so be sure check out the updated calculation by following the link below.
See our latest analysis for Apollo Endosurgery
Want to help shape the future of investing tools and platforms? Take the survey and be part of one of the most advanced studies of stock market investors to date.
What’s the value?
I’m using the 2-stage growth model, which simply means we take in account two stages of company’s growth. In the initial period the company may have a higher growth rate and the second stage is usually assumed to have perpetual stable growth rate. In the first stage we need to estimate the cash flows to the business over the next five years. For this I used the consensus of the analysts covering the stock, as you can see below. The sum of these cash flows is then discounted to today’s value.
5-year cash flow forecast
2019 | 2020 | 2021 | 2022 | 2023 | |
Levered FCF ($, Millions) | $-34.24 | $-5.05 | $-0.52 | $4.23 | $12.37 |
Source | Analyst x1 | Analyst x1 | Analyst x1 | Analyst x1 | Analyst x1 |
Present Value Discounted @ 11.53% | $-30.70 | $-4.06 | $-0.37 | $2.73 | $7.17 |
Present Value of 5-year Cash Flow (PVCF)= -US$25.2m
After calculating the present value of future cash flows in the intial 5-year period we need to calculate the Terminal Value, which accounts for all the future cash flows beyond the first stage. For a number of reasons a very conservative growth rate is used that cannot exceed that of the GDP. In this case I have used the 10-year government bond rate (2.7%). In the same way as with the 5-year ‘growth’ period, we discount this to today’s value at a cost of equity of 11.5%.
Terminal Value (TV) = FCF2023 × (1 + g) ÷ (r – g) = US$12m × (1 + 2.7%) ÷ (11.5% – 2.7%) = US$144m
Present Value of Terminal Value (PVTV) = TV / (1 + r)5 = US$144m ÷ ( 1 + 11.5%)5 = US$84m
The total value is the sum of cash flows for the next five years and the discounted terminal value, which results in the Total Equity Value, which in this case is US$58m. In the final step we divide the equity value by the number of shares outstanding. If the stock is an depositary receipt (represents a specified number of shares in a foreign corporation) or ADR then we use the equivalent number. This results in an intrinsic value of $2.67. Relative to the current share price of $3.38, the stock is fair value, maybe slightly overvalued and not available at a discount at this time.
The assumptions
The calculation above is very dependent on two assumptions. The first is the discount rate and the other is the cash flows. If you don’t agree with my result, have a go at the calculation yourself and play with the assumptions. Because we are looking at Apollo Endosurgery as potential shareholders, the cost of equity is used as the discount rate, rather than the cost of capital (or weighed average cost of capital, WACC) which accounts for debt. In this calculation I’ve used 11.5%, which is based on a levered beta of 1.211. This is derived from the Bottom-Up Beta method based on comparable companies, with an imposed limit between 0.8 and 2.0, which is a reasonable range for a stable business.
Next Steps:
Valuation is only one side of the coin in terms of building your investment thesis, and it shouldn’t be the only metric you look at when researching a company. What is the reason for the share price to differ from the intrinsic value? For APEN, there are three fundamental aspects you should further research:
Financial Health: Does APEN have a healthy balance sheet? Take a look at our free balance sheet analysis with six simple checks on key factors like leverage and risk.
Future Earnings: How does APEN’s growth rate compare to its peers and the wider market? Dig deeper into the analyst consensus number for the upcoming years by interacting with our free analyst growth expectation chart.
Other High Quality Alternatives: Are there other high quality stocks you could be holding instead of APEN? Explore our interactive list of high quality stocks to get an idea of what else is out there you may be missing!
PS. Simply Wall St does a DCF calculation for every US stock every 6 hours, so if you want to find the intrinsic value of any other stock just search here.
To help readers see past the short term volatility of the financial market, we aim to bring you a long-term focused research analysis purely driven by fundamental data. Note that our analysis does not factor in the latest price-sensitive company announcements.
The author is an independent contributor and at the time of publication had no position in the stocks mentioned. For errors that warrant correction please contact the editor at editorial-team@simplywallst.com.
