It is hard to get excited after looking at Ferrari's (NYSE:RACE) recent performance, when its stock has declined 8.1% over the past three months. But if you pay close attention, you might gather that its strong financials could mean that the stock could potentially see an increase in value in the long-term, given how markets usually reward companies with good financial health. In this article, we decided to focus on Ferrari's ROE.

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 short, ROE shows the profit each dollar generates with respect to its shareholder investments.

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 Ferrari is:

43% = €1.4b ÷ €3.3b (Based on the trailing twelve months to September 2024).

The 'return' refers to a company's earnings over the last year. One way to conceptualize this is that for each $1 of shareholders' capital it has, the company made $0.43 in profit.

What Has ROE Got To Do With 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.

Ferrari's Earnings Growth And 43% ROE

To begin with, Ferrari has a pretty high ROE which is interesting. Additionally, the company's ROE is higher compared to the industry average of 15% which is quite remarkable. This probably laid the groundwork for Ferrari's moderate 18% net income growth seen over the past five years.

As a next step, we compared Ferrari's net income growth with the industry and found that the company has a similar growth figure when compared with the industry average growth rate of 20% in the same period.

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. Is Ferrari fairly valued compared to other companies? These 3 valuation measures might help you decide.

Is Ferrari Efficiently Re-investing Its Profits?

Ferrari has a healthy combination of a moderate three-year median payout ratio of 31% (or a retention ratio of 69%) and a respectable amount of growth in earnings as we saw above, meaning that the company has been making efficient use of its profits.

Moreover, Ferrari is determined to keep sharing its profits with shareholders which we infer from its long history of nine years of paying a dividend. Our latest analyst data shows that the future payout ratio of the company over the next three years is expected to be approximately 36%. As a result, Ferrari's ROE is not expected to change by much either, which we inferred from the analyst estimate of 36% for future ROE.

Conclusion

Overall, we are quite pleased with Ferrari's performance. 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.