Evolution Mining's (ASX:EVN) stock is up by a considerable 21% over the past three months. However, we decided to pay attention to the company's fundamentals which don't appear to give a clear sign about the company's financial health. Specifically, we decided to study Evolution Mining's ROE in this article.

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. Put another way, it reveals the company's success at turning shareholder investments into profits.

Check out our latest analysis for Evolution Mining

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 Evolution Mining is:

4.1% = AU$159m ÷ AU$3.8b (Based on the trailing twelve months to December 2023).

The 'return' refers to a company's earnings over the last year. That means that for every A$1 worth of shareholders' equity, the company generated A$0.04 in profit.

Why Is ROE Important For Earnings Growth?

So far, we've learned that ROE is a measure of a company's profitability. 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.

A Side By Side comparison of Evolution Mining's Earnings Growth And 4.1% ROE

It is hard to argue that Evolution Mining's ROE is much good in and of itself. Even compared to the average industry ROE of 10%, the company's ROE is quite dismal. Therefore, it might not be wrong to say that the five year net income decline of 3.3% seen by Evolution Mining was possibly a result of it having a lower ROE. We believe that there also might be other aspects that are negatively influencing the company's earnings prospects. Such as - low earnings retention or poor allocation of capital.

However, when we compared Evolution Mining's growth with the industry we found that while the company's earnings have been shrinking, the industry has seen an earnings growth of 19% in the same period. This is quite worrisome.

The basis for attaching value to a company is, to a great extent, tied to its earnings growth. The investor should try to establish if the expected growth or decline in earnings, whichever the case may be, is priced in. By doing so, they will have an idea if the stock is headed into clear blue waters or if swampy waters await. One good indicator of expected earnings growth is the P/E ratio which determines the price the market is willing to pay for a stock based on its earnings prospects. So, you may want to check if Evolution Mining is trading on a high P/E or a low P/E, relative to its industry.

Is Evolution Mining Efficiently Re-investing Its Profits?

Despite having a normal three-year median payout ratio of 46% (where it is retaining 54% of its profits), Evolution Mining has seen a decline in earnings as we saw above. So there might be other factors at play here which could potentially be hampering growth. For example, the business has faced some headwinds.

In addition, Evolution Mining has been paying dividends over a period of at least ten years suggesting that keeping up dividend payments is way more important to the management even if it comes at the cost of business growth. Our latest analyst data shows that the future payout ratio of the company is expected to drop to 33% over the next three years. As a result, the expected drop in Evolution Mining's payout ratio explains the anticipated rise in the company's future ROE to 12%, over the same period.

Summary

On the whole, we feel that the performance shown by Evolution Mining can be open to many interpretations. While the company does have a high rate of reinvestment, the low ROE means that all that reinvestment is not reaping any benefit to its investors, and moreover, its having a negative impact on the earnings growth. That being so, the latest industry analyst forecasts show that the analysts are expecting to see a huge improvement in the company's earnings 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.

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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.