Tower Limited's (NZSE:TWR) Fundamentals Look Pretty Strong: Could The Market Be Wrong About The Stock?

editorial-team@simplywallst.com (Simply Wall St)

Thu, Jan 30, 2025, 5:49 PM 4 min read

Tower (NZSE:TWR) has had a rough month with its share price down 4.1%. But if you pay close attention, you might find that its key financial indicators look quite decent, which could mean that the stock could potentially rise in the long-term given how markets usually reward more resilient long-term fundamentals. Particularly, we will be paying attention to Tower's ROE today.

Return on equity or ROE is a key measure used to assess how efficiently a company's management is utilizing the company's capital. In other words, it is a profitability ratio which measures the rate of return on the capital provided by the company's shareholders.

View our latest analysis for Tower

How Do You Calculate Return On Equity?

ROE can be calculated by using the formula:

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

So, based on the above formula, the ROE for Tower is:

20% = NZ$71m ÷ NZ$360m (Based on the trailing twelve months to September 2024).

The 'return' is the yearly profit. One way to conceptualize this is that for each NZ$1 of shareholders' capital it has, the company made NZ$0.20 in profit.

What Is The Relationship Between ROE And Earnings Growth?

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

Tower's Earnings Growth And 20% ROE

To begin with, Tower seems to have a respectable ROE. On comparing with the average industry ROE of 13% the company's ROE looks pretty remarkable. This certainly adds some context to Tower's exceptional 23% net income growth seen over the past five years. We reckon that there could also be other factors at play here. For example, it is possible that the company's management has made some good strategic decisions, or that the company has a low payout ratio.

We then performed a comparison between Tower's net income growth with the industry, which revealed that the company's growth is similar to the average industry growth of 20% in the same 5-year period.

past-earnings-growth — NZSE:TWR Past Earnings Growth January 31st 2025

Earnings growth is an important metric to consider when valuing a stock. The investor should try to establish if the expected growth or decline in earnings, whichever the case may be, is priced in. This then helps them determine if the stock is placed for a bright or bleak future. If you're wondering about Tower's's valuation, check out this gauge of its price-to-earnings ratio, as compared to its industry.

Is Tower Efficiently Re-investing Its Profits?

Tower's very high three-year median payout ratio of 109% suggests that the company is paying more to its shareholders than what it is earning. In spite of this, the company was able to grow its earnings significantly, as we saw above. Having said that, the high payout ratio is definitely risky and something to keep an eye on.

Besides, Tower has been paying dividends for at least ten years or more. This shows that the company is committed to sharing profits with its shareholders. Upon studying the latest analysts' consensus data, we found that the company's future payout ratio is expected to drop to 70% over the next three years. Despite the lower expected payout ratio, the company's ROE is not expected to change by much.

Summary

In total, it does look like Tower has some positive aspects to its business. Namely, its high earnings growth, which was likely due to its high ROE. However, investors could have benefitted even more from the high ROE, had the company been reinvesting more of its earnings. As discussed earlier, the company is retaining hardly any of its profits. With that said, the latest industry analyst forecasts reveal that the company's earnings growth is expected to slow down. 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.

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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.