Should You Be Concerned About Ironwood Pharmaceuticals, Inc.'s (NASDAQ:IRWD) Historical Volatility?
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If you're interested in Ironwood Pharmaceuticals, Inc. (NASDAQ:IRWD), then you might want to consider its beta (a measure of share price volatility) in order to understand how the stock could impact your portfolio. Volatility is considered to be a measure of risk in modern finance theory. Investors may think of volatility as falling into two main categories. The first type is company specific volatility. Investors use diversification across uncorrelated stocks to reduce this kind of price volatility across the portfolio. The second type is the broader market volatility, which you cannot diversify away, since it arises from macroeconomic factors which directly affects all the stocks on the market.
Some stocks are more sensitive to general market forces than others. Beta is a widely used metric to measure a stock's exposure to market risk (volatility). Before we go on, it's worth noting that Warren Buffett pointed out in his 2014 letter to shareholders that 'volatility is far from synonymous with risk.' Having said that, beta can still be rather useful. The first thing to understand about beta is that the beta of the overall market is one. A stock with a beta greater than one is more sensitive to broader market movements than a stock with a beta of less than one.
Check out our latest analysis for Ironwood Pharmaceuticals
What IRWD's beta value tells investors
Given that it has a beta of 1.59, we can surmise that the Ironwood Pharmaceuticals share price has been fairly sensitive to market volatility (over the last 5 years). If the past is any guide, we would expect that Ironwood Pharmaceuticals shares will rise quicker than the markets in times of optimism, but fall faster in times of pessimism. Many would argue that beta is useful in position sizing, but fundamental metrics such as revenue and earnings are more important overall. You can see Ironwood Pharmaceuticals's revenue and earnings in the image below.
Does IRWD's size influence the expected beta?
With a market capitalisation of US$1.7b, Ironwood Pharmaceuticals is a small cap stock. However, it is big enough to catch the attention of professional investors. It has a relatively high beta, which is not unusual among small-cap stocks. Because it takes less capital to move the share price of a smaller company, actively traded small-cap stocks often have a higher beta that a similar large-cap stock.
What this means for you:
Since Ironwood Pharmaceuticals has a reasonably high beta, it's worth considering why it is so heavily influenced by broader market sentiment. For example, it might be a high growth stock or have a lot of operating leverage in its business model. In order to fully understand whether IRWD is a good investment for you, we also need to consider important company-specific fundamentals such as Ironwood Pharmaceuticals’s financial health and performance track record. I highly recommend you dive deeper by considering the following:
Future Outlook: What are well-informed industry analysts predicting for IRWD’s future growth? Take a look at our free research report of analyst consensus for IRWD’s outlook.
Past Track Record: Has IRWD been consistently performing well irrespective of the ups and downs in the market? Go into more detail in the past performance analysis and take a look at the free visual representations of IRWD's historicals for more clarity.
Other Interesting Stocks: It's worth checking to see how IRWD measures up against other companies on valuation. You could start with this free list of prospective options.
We aim to bring you long-term focused research analysis driven by fundamental data. Note that our analysis may not factor in the latest price-sensitive company announcements or qualitative material.
If you spot an error that warrants correction, please contact the editor at editorial-team@simplywallst.com. This article by Simply Wall St is general in nature. It does not constitute a recommendation to buy or sell any stock, and does not take account of your objectives, or your financial situation. Simply Wall St has no position in the stocks mentioned. Thank you for reading.
