Does the August share price for Nokia Corporation (HEL:NOKIA) reflect what it's really worth? Today, we will estimate the stock's intrinsic value by taking the foreast future cash flows of the company and discounting them back to today's value. I will be using the Discounted Cash Flow (DCF) model. It may sound complicated, but actually it is quite simple!
Companies can be valued in a lot of ways, so we would point out that a DCF is not perfect for every situation. If you want to learn more about discounted cash flow, the rationale behind this calculation can be read in detail in the Simply Wall St analysis model.
We're 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 a stable growth rate. To start off with, we need to estimate the next ten years of cash flows. Where possible we use analyst estimates, but when these aren't available we extrapolate the previous free cash flow (FCF) from the last estimate or reported value. We assume companies with shrinking free cash flow will slow their rate of shrinkage, and that companies with growing free cash flow will see their growth rate slow, over this period. We do this to reflect that growth tends to slow more in the early years than it does in later years.
A DCF is all about the idea that a dollar in the future is less valuable than a dollar today, so we discount the value of these future cash flows to their estimated value in today's dollars:
10-year free cash flow (FCF) forecast
2020
2021
2022
2023
2024
2025
2026
2027
2028
2029
Levered FCF (€, Millions)
€1.5b
€2.1b
€1.8b
€1.6b
€1.5b
€1.4b
€1.4b
€1.3b
€1.3b
€1.3b
Growth Rate Estimate Source
Analyst x12
Analyst x8
Analyst x1
Est @ -10.82%
Est @ -7.41%
Est @ -5.03%
Est @ -3.36%
Est @ -2.19%
Est @ -1.37%
Est @ -0.8%
Present Value (€, Millions) Discounted @ 8.13%
€1.4k
€1.8k
€1.4k
€1.2k
€1.0k
€891.1
€796.5
€720.5
€657.2
€603.0
("Est" = FCF growth rate estimated by Simply Wall St) Present Value of 10-year Cash Flow (PVCF)= €10.6b
The second stage is also known as Terminal Value, this is the business's cash flow after the first stage. The Gordon Growth formula is used to calculate Terminal Value at a future annual growth rate equal to the 10-year government bond rate of 0.5%. We discount the terminal cash flows to today's value at a cost of equity of 8.1%.
Present Value of Terminal Value (PVTV) = TV / (1 + r)10 = €€17b ÷ ( 1 + 8.1%)10 = €7.99b
The total value, or equity value, is then the sum of the present value of the future cash flows, which in this case is €18.54b. To get the intrinsic value per share, we divide this by the total number of shares outstanding. This results in an intrinsic value estimate of €3.31. Compared to the current share price of €4.44, the company appears potentially overvalued at the time of writing. Valuations are imprecise instruments though, rather like a telescope - move a few degrees and end up in a different galaxy. Do keep this in mind.
HLSE:NOKIA Intrinsic value, August 29th 2019
Important assumptions
The calculation above is very dependent on two assumptions. The first is the discount rate and the other is the cash flows. Part of investing is coming up with your own evaluation of a company's future performance, so try the calculation yourself and check your own assumptions. The DCF also does not consider the possible cyclicality of an industry, or a company's future capital requirements, so it does not give a full picture of a company's potential performance. Given that we are looking at Nokia as potential shareholders, the cost of equity is used as the discount rate, rather than the cost of capital (or weighted average cost of capital, WACC) which accounts for debt. In this calculation we've used 8.1%, which is based on a levered beta of 1.165. Beta is a measure of a stock's volatility, compared to the market as a whole. We get our beta from the industry average beta of globally comparable companies, with an imposed limit between 0.8 and 2.0, which is a reasonable range for a stable business.
Next Steps:
Whilst important, DCF calculation shouldn’t be the only metric you look at when researching a company. The DCF model is not a perfect stock valuation tool. Rather it should be seen as a guide to "what assumptions need to be true for this stock to be under/overvalued?" If a company grows at a different rate, or if its cost of equity or risk free rate changes sharply, the output can look very different. What is the reason for the share price to differ from the intrinsic value? For Nokia, I've put together three important aspects you should look at:
Future Earnings: How does NOKIA'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 NOKIA? Explore our interactive list of high quality stocks to get an idea of what else is out there you may be missing!
PS. The Simply Wall St app conducts a discounted cash flow valuation for every stock on the HEL every day. If you want to find the calculation for other stocks just search here.
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.
