It is hard to get excited after looking at Humanwell Healthcare (Group)Ltd's (SHSE:600079) recent performance, when its stock has declined 12% over the past month. 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. Particularly, we will be paying attention to Humanwell Healthcare (Group)Ltd'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 simpler terms, it measures the profitability of a company in relation to shareholder's equity.

How Is ROE Calculated?

Return on equity 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 Humanwell Healthcare (Group)Ltd is:

13% = CN¥2.6b ÷ CN¥20b (Based on the trailing twelve months to March 2024).

The 'return' refers to a company's earnings over the last year. One way to conceptualize this is that for each CN¥1 of shareholders' capital it has, the company made CN¥0.13 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. Depending on how much of these profits the company reinvests or "retains", and how effectively it does so, we are then able to assess a company's earnings growth potential. 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.

Humanwell Healthcare (Group)Ltd's Earnings Growth And 13% ROE

At first glance, Humanwell Healthcare (Group)Ltd seems to have a decent ROE. Especially when compared to the industry average of 7.6% the company's ROE looks pretty impressive. This probably laid the ground for Humanwell Healthcare (Group)Ltd's significant 47% net income growth seen over the past five years. We reckon that there could also be other factors at play here. For instance, the company has a low payout ratio or is being managed efficiently.

As a next step, we compared Humanwell Healthcare (Group)Ltd's net income growth with the industry, and pleasingly, we found that the growth seen by the company is higher than the average industry growth of 9.2%.

Earnings growth is a huge factor in stock valuation. What investors need to determine next is if the expected earnings growth, or the lack of it, is already built into the share price. This then helps them determine if the stock is placed for a bright or bleak future. 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 Humanwell Healthcare (Group)Ltd is trading on a high P/E or a low P/E, relative to its industry.

Is Humanwell Healthcare (Group)Ltd Efficiently Re-investing Its Profits?

Humanwell Healthcare (Group)Ltd's ' three-year median payout ratio is on the lower side at 12% implying that it is retaining a higher percentage (88%) of its profits. This suggests that the management is reinvesting most of the profits to grow the business as evidenced by the growth seen by the company.

Additionally, Humanwell Healthcare (Group)Ltd has paid dividends over a period of at least ten years which means that the company is pretty serious about sharing its profits with shareholders. Our latest analyst data shows that the future payout ratio of the company is expected to rise to 28% over the next three years. However, the company's ROE is not expected to change by much despite the higher expected payout ratio.

Conclusion

On the whole, we feel that Humanwell Healthcare (Group)Ltd's 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 substantial growth in its earnings. That being so, a study of the latest analyst forecasts show that the company is expected to see a slowdown in its future earnings growth. To know more about the latest analysts predictions for the company, check out this visualization of analyst forecasts 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.

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