Here’s What World Acceptance Corporation’s (NASDAQ:WRLD) P/E Is Telling Us

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The goal of this article is to teach you how to use price to earnings ratios (P/E ratios). We’ll show how you can use World Acceptance Corporation’s (NASDAQ:WRLD) P/E ratio to inform your assessment of the investment opportunity. Based on the last twelve months, World Acceptance’s P/E ratio is 14.42. In other words, at today’s prices, investors are paying $14.42 for every $1 in prior year profit.

View our latest analysis for World Acceptance

How Do You Calculate A P/E Ratio?

The formula for price to earnings is:

Price to Earnings Ratio = Price per Share ÷ Earnings per Share (EPS)

Or for World Acceptance:

P/E of 14.42 = $105.13 ÷ $7.29 (Based on the trailing twelve months to December 2018.)

Is A High Price-to-Earnings Ratio Good?

A higher P/E ratio means that investors are paying a higher price for each $1 of company earnings. That is not a good or a bad thing per se, but a high P/E does imply buyers are optimistic about the future.

How Growth Rates Impact P/E Ratios

Companies that shrink earnings per share quickly will rapidly decrease the ‘E’ in the equation. Therefore, even if you pay a low multiple of earnings now, that multiple will become higher in the future. So while a stock may look cheap based on past earnings, it could be expensive based on future earnings.

World Acceptance increased earnings per share by an impressive 12% over the last twelve months. Unfortunately, earnings per share are down 11% a year, over 5 years.

How Does World Acceptance’s P/E Ratio Compare To Its Peers?

The P/E ratio indicates whether the market has higher or lower expectations of a company. The image below shows that World Acceptance has a higher P/E than the average (10) P/E for companies in the consumer finance industry.

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That means that the market expects World Acceptance will outperform other companies in its industry. Clearly the market expects growth, but it isn’t guaranteed. So investors should delve deeper. I like to check if company insiders have been buying or selling.

Remember: P/E Ratios Don’t Consider The Balance Sheet

The ‘Price’ in P/E reflects the market capitalization of the company. That means it doesn’t take debt or cash into account. Hypothetically, a company could reduce its future P/E ratio by spending its cash (or taking on debt) to achieve higher earnings.

Such spending might be good or bad, overall, but the key point here is that you need to look at debt to understand the P/E ratio in context.

How Does World Acceptance’s Debt Impact Its P/E Ratio?

World Acceptance has net debt worth 29% of its market capitalization. This is enough debt that you’d have to make some adjustments before using the P/E ratio to compare it to a company with net cash.

The Bottom Line On World Acceptance’s P/E Ratio

World Acceptance has a P/E of 14.4. That’s below the average in the US market, which is 16.9. The company does have a little debt, and EPS growth was good last year. If the company can continue to grow earnings, then the current P/E may be unjustifiably low.

Investors have an opportunity when market expectations about a stock are wrong. If it is underestimating a company, investors can make money by buying and holding the shares until the market corrects itself. So this free visualization of the analyst consensus on future earnings could help you make the right decision about whether to buy, sell, or hold.