Declining Stock and Solid Fundamentals: Is The Market Wrong About Agilent Technologies, Inc. (NYSE:A)?

Simply Wall St · 11/13/2023 10:52

With its stock down 14% over the past three months, it is easy to disregard Agilent Technologies (NYSE:A). However, a closer look at its sound financials might cause you to think again. Given that fundamentals usually drive long-term market outcomes, the company is worth looking at. Specifically, we decided to study Agilent Technologies' ROE in this article.

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

Check out our latest analysis for Agilent Technologies

How Is ROE Calculated?

The formula for return on equity is:

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

So, based on the above formula, the ROE for Agilent Technologies is:

20% = US$1.1b ÷ US$5.6b (Based on the trailing twelve months to July 2023).

The 'return' is the yearly profit. Another way to think of that is that for every $1 worth of equity, the company was able to earn $0.20 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. 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.

A Side By Side comparison of Agilent Technologies' Earnings Growth And 20% ROE

To begin with, Agilent Technologies seems to have a respectable ROE. Especially when compared to the industry average of 12% the company's ROE looks pretty impressive. This certainly adds some context to Agilent Technologies' decent 14% net income growth seen over the past five years.

As a next step, we compared Agilent Technologies' net income growth with the industry and were disappointed to see that the company's growth is lower than the industry average growth of 21% in the same period.

past-earnings-growth
NYSE:A Past Earnings Growth November 13th 2023

The basis for attaching value to a company is, to a great extent, tied to its earnings growth. It’s important for an investor to know whether the market has priced in the company's expected earnings growth (or decline). Doing so will help them establish if the stock's future looks promising or ominous. Has the market priced in the future outlook for A? You can find out in our latest intrinsic value infographic research report.

Is Agilent Technologies Using Its Retained Earnings Effectively?

Agilent Technologies has a low three-year median payout ratio of 20%, meaning that the company retains the remaining 80% of its profits. This suggests that the management is reinvesting most of the profits to grow the business.

Moreover, Agilent Technologies 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. Our latest analyst data shows that the future payout ratio of the company is expected to drop to 16% over the next three years. The fact that the company's ROE is expected to rise to 30% over the same period is explained by the drop in the payout ratio.

Summary

On the whole, we feel that Agilent Technologies' performance has been quite good. Specifically, we like that the company is reinvesting a huge chunk of its profits at a high rate of return. This of course has caused the company to see a good amount of growth in its earnings. The latest industry analyst forecasts show that the company is expected to maintain its current growth rate. 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.