Are Strong Financial Prospects The Force That Is Driving The Momentum In Casey's General Stores, Inc.'s NASDAQ:CASY) Stock?

Casey's General Stores (NASDAQ:CASY) has had a great run on the share market with its stock up by a significant 10% over the last three months. Given the company's impressive performance, we decided to study its financial indicators more closely as a company's financial health over the long-term usually dictates market outcomes. Particularly, we will be paying attention to Casey's General Stores' ROE today.

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.

See our latest analysis for Casey's General Stores

How Do You Calculate Return On Equity?

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 Casey's General Stores is:

16% = US$374m ÷ US$2.4b (Based on the trailing twelve months to July 2022).

The 'return' is the amount earned after tax over the last twelve months. One way to conceptualize this is that for each $1 of shareholders' capital it has, the company made $0.16 in profit.

What Is The Relationship Between ROE And Earnings Growth?

Thus far, we have learned that ROE measures how efficiently a company is generating its profits. 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 all else is equal, companies that have both a higher return on equity and higher profit retention are usually the ones that have a higher growth rate when compared to companies that don't have the same features.

Casey's General Stores' Earnings Growth And 16% ROE

To begin with, Casey's General Stores seems to have a respectable ROE. Further, the company's ROE is similar to the industry average of 13%. This certainly adds some context to Casey's General Stores' moderate 7.9% net income growth seen over the past five years.

As a next step, we compared Casey's General Stores' net income growth with the industry and were disappointed to see that the company's growth is lower than the industry average growth of 13% in the same period.

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. Doing so will help them establish if the stock's future looks promising or ominous. What is CASY worth today? The intrinsic value infographic in our free research report helps visualize whether CASY is currently mispriced by the market.

Is Casey's General Stores Using Its Retained Earnings Effectively?

Casey's General Stores has a low three-year median payout ratio of 16%, meaning that the company retains the remaining 84% of its profits. This suggests that the management is reinvesting most of the profits to grow the business.

Besides, Casey's General Stores 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 is expected to keep paying out approximately 16% of its profits over the next three years. As a result, Casey's General Stores' ROE is not expected to change by much either, which we inferred from the analyst estimate of 13% for future ROE.

Summary

In total, we are pretty happy with Casey's General Stores' 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 a good amount of 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. 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.

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