Stepan Company's (NYSE:SCL) Has Performed Well But Fundamentals Look Varied: Is There A Clear Direction For The Stock?
Stepan Company's (NYSE:SCL) Has Performed Well But Fundamentals Look Varied: Is There A Clear Direction For The Stock?
Stepan's (NYSE:SCL) stock is up by 4.7% over the past week. However, we decided to study the company's mixed-bag of fundamentals to assess what this could mean for future share prices, as stock prices tend to be aligned with a company's long-term financial performance. Specifically, we decided to study Stepan's ROE in this article.
斯蒂芬（紐約證券交易所代碼：SCL）的股票在過去一週上漲了4.7％。但是，我們決定研究公司的混合基本面，以評估這對未來股價可能意味着什麼，因爲股價往往與公司的長期財務表現一致。具體而言，我們決定在本文中研究斯蒂芬的投資回報率。
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 other words, it is a profitability ratio which measures the rate of return on the capital provided by the company's shareholders.
股本回報率或投資回報率是股東需要考慮的重要因素，因爲它可以告訴他們資本再投資的有效性。換句話說，它是衡量公司股東提供的資本回報率的盈利比率。
How Is ROE Calculated?
ROE 是如何計算的？
The formula for return on equity is:
股本回報率的公式是：
Return on Equity = Net Profit (from continuing operations) ÷ Shareholders' Equity
股本回報率 = 淨利潤（來自持續經營業務）÷ 股東權益
So, based on the above formula, the ROE for Stepan is:
因此，根據上述公式，Stepan 的投資回報率爲：
3.1% = US$38m ÷ US$1.2b (Based on the trailing twelve months to March 2024).
3.1% = 3,800萬美元 ÷ 12億美元（基於截至2024年3月的過去十二個月）。
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 $0.03 in profit.
“回報” 是過去十二個月的利潤。對此進行概念化的一種方法是，該公司每擁有1美元的股東資本，就能獲得0.03美元的利潤。
What Has ROE Got To Do With Earnings Growth?
投資回報率與收益增長有什麼關係？
We have already established that ROE serves as an efficient profit-generating gauge for a company's future earnings. We now need to evaluate how much profit the company reinvests or "retains" for future growth which then gives us an idea about the growth potential of the company. 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.
我們已經確定，投資回報率是衡量公司未來收益的有效利潤創造指標。我們現在需要評估公司爲未來增長再投資或 “保留” 了多少利潤，這樣我們就可以了解公司的增長潛力。假設其他一切都保持不變，那麼與不一定具有這些特徵的公司相比，投資回報率和利潤保留率越高，公司的增長率就越高。
Stepan's Earnings Growth And 3.1% ROE
Stepan 的收益增長和 3.1% 的投資回報率
It is hard to argue that Stepan's ROE is much good in and of itself. Not just that, even compared to the industry average of 12%, the company's ROE is entirely unremarkable. Therefore, it might not be wrong to say that the five year net income decline of 6.1% seen by Stepan was possibly a result of it having a lower ROE. We believe that there also might be other aspects that are negatively influencing the company's earnings prospects. For instance, the company has a very high payout ratio, or is faced with competitive pressures.
很難說斯蒂芬的投資回報率本身就非常好。不僅如此，即使與行業平均水平的12％相比，該公司的投資回報率也完全不引人注目。因此，說Stepan的五年淨收入下降6.1％可能是其投資回報率下降的結果，這可能沒有錯。我們認爲，可能還有其他方面對公司的盈利前景產生負面影響。例如，該公司的派息率非常高，或者面臨競爭壓力。
That being said, we compared Stepan's performance with the industry and were concerned when we found that while the company has shrunk its earnings, the industry has grown its earnings at a rate of 14% in the same 5-year period.
話雖如此，我們將Stepan的表現與該行業的表現進行了比較，當我們發現儘管該公司縮減了收益，但該行業在5年同期的收益增長了14％時，我們對此感到擔憂。
Earnings growth is a huge factor in stock valuation. It's important for an investor to know whether the market has priced in the company's expected earnings growth (or decline). By doing so, they will have an idea if the stock is headed into clear blue waters or if swampy waters await. Is SCL fairly valued? This infographic on the company's intrinsic value has everything you need to know.
收益增長是股票估值的重要因素。對於投資者來說，重要的是要知道市場是否對公司的預期收益增長（或下降）進行了定價。通過這樣做，他們將知道股票是走向清澈的藍色海水還是沼澤水域在等着呢。SCL 的價值是否合理？這張關於公司內在價值的信息圖包含了你需要知道的一切。
Is Stepan Making Efficient Use Of Its Profits?
Stepan 是否在有效利用其利潤？
Stepan's low three-year median payout ratio of 21% (implying that it retains the remaining 79% of its profits) comes as a surprise when you pair it with the shrinking earnings. The low payout should mean that the company is retaining most of its earnings and consequently, should see some growth. It looks like there might be some other reasons to explain the lack in that respect. For example, the business could be in decline.
Stepan的三年低派息率中位數爲21％（這意味着它保留了剩餘的79％的利潤），與不斷萎縮的收益相結合，這令人驚訝。低支出應意味着該公司保留了大部分收益，因此應該會出現一些增長。看來可能還有其他一些原因可以解釋這方面的不足。例如，業務可能會下滑。
In addition, Stepan has been paying dividends over a period of at least ten years suggesting that keeping up dividend payments is way more important to the management even if it comes at the cost of business growth.
此外，Stepan至少十年來一直在支付股息，這表明即使以犧牲業務增長爲代價，維持股息支付對管理層來說也更爲重要。
Summary
摘要
Overall, we have mixed feelings about Stepan. Even though it appears to be retaining most of its profits, given the low ROE, investors may not be benefitting from all that reinvestment after all. The low earnings growth suggests our theory correct. With that said, we studied the latest analyst forecasts and found that while the company has shrunk its earnings in the past, analysts expect its earnings to grow in the future. To know more about the latest analysts predictions for the company, check out this visualization of analyst forecasts for the company.
總的來說，我們對 Stepan 有喜憂參半的感覺。儘管鑑於投資回報率低，它似乎保留了大部分利潤，但投資者畢竟可能無法從所有這些再投資中受益。低收入增長表明我們的理論是正確的。話雖如此，我們研究了分析師的最新預測，發現儘管該公司過去曾縮減收益，但分析師預計其未來收益將增長。要詳細了解分析師對公司的最新預測，請查看該公司的分析師預測的可視化。
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Simply Wall St的這篇文章本質上是籠統的。我們僅使用公正的方法根據歷史數據和分析師的預測提供評論，我們的文章無意作爲財務建議。它不構成買入或賣出任何股票的建議，也沒有考慮到您的目標或財務狀況。我們的目標是爲您提供由基本數據驅動的長期重點分析。請注意，我們的分析可能不考慮最新的價格敏感型公司公告或定性材料。簡而言之，華爾街沒有持有任何上述股票的頭寸。
譯文內容由第三人軟體翻譯。