Molina Healthcare, Inc.'s (NYSE:MOH) Stock Been Rising: Are Strong Financials Guiding The Market?
Most readers would already know that Molina Healthcare's (NYSE:MOH) stock increased by 2.4% over the past week. Since the market usually pay for a company’s long-term financial health, we decided to study the company’s fundamentals to see if they could be influencing the market. In this article, we decided to focus on Molina Healthcare's ROE.
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. Put another way, it reveals the company's success at turning shareholder investments into profits.
See our latest analysis for Molina Healthcare
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 Molina Healthcare is:
40% = US$797m ÷ US$2.0b (Based on the trailing twelve months to June 2020).
The 'return' is the profit over the last twelve months. Another way to think of that is that for every $1 worth of equity, the company was able to earn $0.40 in profit.
What Is The Relationship Between ROE And Earnings Growth?
We have already established that ROE serves as an efficient profit-generating gauge for a company's future earnings. 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. Assuming everything else remains unchanged, the higher the ROE and profit retention, the higher the growth rate of a company compared to companies that don't necessarily bear these characteristics.
Molina Healthcare's Earnings Growth And 40% ROE
To begin with, Molina Healthcare has a pretty high ROE which is interesting. Secondly, even when compared to the industry average of 12% the company's ROE is quite impressive. Under the circumstances, Molina Healthcare's considerable five year net income growth of 43% was to be expected.
Next, on comparing with the industry net income growth, we found that Molina Healthcare's growth is quite high when compared to the industry average growth of 11% in the same period, which is great to see.
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. Doing so will help them establish if the stock's future looks promising or ominous. Is Molina Healthcare fairly valued compared to other companies? These 3 valuation measures might help you decide.
Is Molina Healthcare Efficiently Re-investing Its Profits?
Given that Molina Healthcare doesn't pay any dividend to its shareholders, we infer that the company has been reinvesting all of its profits to grow its business.
Conclusion
In total, we are pretty happy with Molina Healthcare's performance. 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. Having said that, the company's earnings growth is expected to slow down, as forecasted in the current analyst estimates. 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.
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. 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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