Prospectus in Investment Banking – Part 1
The job of an investment banker includes enabling the flow of information between the company and its investors. When a company is going public for the first time, investors do not have any information about the company. As such, they do not have a strong basis for making a well-informed decision. Hence, it is the […]
Parties Involved in Infrastructure Debt Issuance
Bonds are commonly issued during infrastructure projects. The company holding the equity stake is generally the one issuing the bonds. This means that the company owning equity is the one actually borrowing money from the bondholders and, therefore, the one owing the money back. Even though the responsibility of repaying the loan lies with the […]
How Loss Aversion Affects Investment Decisions
Behavioral financial analysts have conducted a significant amount of research in order to understand how investors process loss. In the process, they have found out that most investors have an innate aversion to losses. This causes them to make wrong decisions while investing. In this article, we will have a closer look at what loss […]
Entity Concept in Financial Accounting
The entity concept is one of the central tenets of accounting. An understanding of the same is therefore of paramount importance to students. However, the entity concept came as a solution to a problem faced by earlier accountants. To understand the benefits of the solution provided, we must look at the problem first. Confusion in […]
Pension Funds and Systemic Risks
Systemic risks received a lot of media attention after the 2008 financial crisis. The world realized that the failure of one financial institution may not remain restricted to the same financial institution. Instead, such a failure can potentially spiral out of control and impact the entire financial system. Up until now, the idea of systemic […]
Another metric that is widely used by investors to gauge the profitability of a company is Return on Assets (ROA). More about this very important ratio has been stated in this article.
Return on Assets = Earnings / Asset Base
The Return on Assets (ROA) ratio shows the relationship between earnings and asset base of the company. The higher the ratio, the better it is. This is because a higher ratio would indicate that the company can produce relatively higher earnings in comparison to its asset base i.e. more capital efficiency.
The ROA ratio assumes that the assets have been valued fairly on the books. However, in real life, it is a known fact that companies keep over and/or under valuing their assets to reduce taxation. This may affect the ROA adversely and reduce its usability as a profitability metric.
The Return on Assets ratio assumes that the company is using all its assets to run the day to day operations. This assumption is likely to be proved incorrect. A lot of companies hold significant cash on their balance sheet. The most valuable company in the world Apple Inc is one such example. Also many other companies hold a lot of impaired and obsolete assets which they plan to sell in the near future. This brings down the Return On Assets (ROA) ratio.
Return on assets compares the earnings that a company has generated to its asset base. The asset base could be financed by equity or by debt but it will not make a difference. Return on Assets is therefore independent of leverage.
Return on Assets is very sensitive to the stage of growth that a company is currently experiencing. In the introduction and growth stage, companies invest a lot of money to create asset bases. They may not use the asset base immediately and the benefits may be realized years later. Hence, two companies in the same industry, but at different stages of growth, will have very different Return On Assets.
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