It is hard to get excited after looking at Amkor Technology's (NASDAQ:AMKR) recent performance, when its stock has declined 17% over the past three months. However, stock prices are usually driven by a company’s financials over the long term, which in this case look pretty respectable. Particularly, we will be paying attention to Amkor Technology's 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. In short, ROE shows the profit each dollar generates with respect to its shareholder investments.

See our latest analysis for Amkor Technology

How Is ROE Calculated?

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 Amkor Technology is:

9.3% = US$380m ÷ US$4.1b (Based on the trailing twelve months to June 2024).

The 'return' is the profit over the last twelve months. One way to conceptualize this is that for each $1 of shareholders' capital it has, the company made $0.09 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. Generally speaking, other things being equal, firms with a high return on equity and profit retention, have a higher growth rate than firms that don’t share these attributes.

Amkor Technology's Earnings Growth And 9.3% ROE

On the face of it, Amkor Technology's ROE is not much to talk about. Next, when compared to the average industry ROE of 12%, the company's ROE leaves us feeling even less enthusiastic. Amkor Technology was still able to see a decent net income growth of 20% over the past five years. So, the growth in the company's earnings could probably have been caused by other variables. 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.

As a next step, we compared Amkor Technology's net income growth with the industry and were disappointed to see that the company's growth is lower than the industry average growth of 26% 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. This then helps them determine if the stock is placed for a bright or bleak future. What is AMKR worth today? The intrinsic value infographic in our free research report helps visualize whether AMKR is currently mispriced by the market.

Is Amkor Technology Making Efficient Use Of Its Profits?

Amkor Technology has a low three-year median payout ratio of 7.2%, meaning that the company retains the remaining 93% of its profits. This suggests that the management is reinvesting most of the profits to grow the business.

Additionally, Amkor Technology has paid dividends over a period of four years which means that the company is pretty serious about sharing its profits with shareholders. Upon studying the latest analysts' consensus data, we found that the company's future payout ratio is expected to rise to 14% over the next three years. However, Amkor Technology's future ROE is expected to rise to 14% despite the expected increase in the company's payout ratio. We infer that there could be other factors that could be driving the anticipated growth in the company's ROE.

Conclusion

In total, it does look like Amkor Technology has some positive aspects to its business. Specifically, its fairly high earnings growth number, which no doubt was backed by the company's high earnings retention. Still, the low ROE means that all that reinvestment is not reaping a lot of benefit to the investors. Having said that, looking at the current analyst estimates, we found that the company's earnings are expected to gain momentum. To know more about the company's future earnings growth forecasts take a look at this free report on analyst forecasts for the company to find out more.

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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.