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Is Akamai Technologies, Inc.'s (NASDAQ:AKAM) Recent Stock Performance Tethered To Its Strong Fundamentals?

Akamai Technologies' (NASDAQ:AKAM) stock is up by a considerable 7.4% over the past month. Since the market usually pay for a company’s long-term fundamentals, we decided to study the company’s key performance indicators to see if they could be influencing the market. Specifically, we decided to study Akamai Technologies' ROE in this article.

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.

See our latest analysis for Akamai Technologies

How Is ROE Calculated?

The formula for ROE is:

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Return on Equity = Net Profit (from continuing operations) ÷ Shareholders' Equity

So, based on the above formula, the ROE for Akamai Technologies is:

12% = US$507m ÷ US$4.2b (Based on the trailing twelve months to September 2022).

The 'return' is the amount earned after tax over the last twelve months. That means that for every $1 worth of shareholders' equity, the company generated $0.12 in profit.

What Has ROE Got To Do With Earnings Growth?

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. 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.

Akamai Technologies' Earnings Growth And 12% ROE

To start with, Akamai Technologies' ROE looks acceptable. Further, the company's ROE is similar to the industry average of 15%. This certainly adds some context to Akamai Technologies' moderate 20% net income growth seen over the past five years.

As a next step, we compared Akamai Technologies' 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 15%.

past-earnings-growth
past-earnings-growth

Earnings growth is an important metric to consider when valuing a stock. What investors need to determine next is if the expected earnings growth, or the lack of it, is already built into the share price. Doing so will help them establish if the stock's future looks promising or ominous. Has the market priced in the future outlook for AKAM? You can find out in our latest intrinsic value infographic research report.

Is Akamai Technologies Efficiently Re-investing Its Profits?

Given that Akamai Technologies doesn't pay any dividend to its shareholders, we infer that the company has been reinvesting all of its profits to grow its business.

Conclusion

Overall, we are quite pleased with Akamai Technologies' performance. In particular, it's great to see that the company is investing heavily into its business and along with a high rate of return, that has resulted in a sizeable growth in its earnings. We also studied the latest analyst forecasts and found that the company's earnings growth is expected be similar to its current growth rate. To know more about the latest analysts predictions for the company, check out this visualization of analyst forecasts for the company.

Have feedback on this article? Concerned about the content? Get in touch with us directly. Alternatively, email editorial-team (at) simplywallst.com.

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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