Dream Office Real Estate Investment Trust (TSE:D.UN) has had a rough three months with its share price down 17%. However, a closer look at its sound financials might cause you to think again. Given that fundamentals usually drive long-term market outcomes, the company is worth looking at. Particularly, we will be paying attention to Dream Office Real Estate Investment Trust's ROE today.

Return on Equity or ROE is a test of how effectively a company is growing its value and managing investors’ money. Put another way, it reveals the company's success at turning shareholder investments into profits.

Check out our latest analysis for Dream Office Real Estate Investment Trust

How To Calculate Return On Equity?

The formula for return on equity is:

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

So, based on the above formula, the ROE for Dream Office Real Estate Investment Trust is:

15% = CA$237m ÷ CA$1.6b (Based on the trailing twelve months to June 2022).

The 'return' is the yearly profit. One way to conceptualize this is that for each CA$1 of shareholders' capital it has, the company made CA$0.15 in profit.

Why Is ROE Important For 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. 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.

Dream Office Real Estate Investment Trust's Earnings Growth And 15% ROE

At first glance, Dream Office Real Estate Investment Trust seems to have a decent ROE. Even when compared to the industry average of 15% the company's ROE looks quite decent. This probably goes some way in explaining Dream Office Real Estate Investment Trust's moderate 17% growth over the past five years amongst other factors.

As a next step, we compared Dream Office Real Estate Investment Trust's net income growth with the industry and found that the company has a similar growth figure when compared with the industry average growth rate of 17% in the same period.

Earnings growth is a huge factor in stock valuation. 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. If you're wondering about Dream Office Real Estate Investment Trust's's valuation, check out this gauge of its price-to-earnings ratio, as compared to its industry.

Is Dream Office Real Estate Investment Trust Using Its Retained Earnings Effectively?

Dream Office Real Estate Investment Trust has a high three-year median payout ratio of 57%. This means that it has only 43% of its income left to reinvest into its business. However, it's not unusual to see a REIT with such a high payout ratio mainly due to statutory requirements. In spite of this, the company was able to grow its earnings by a fair bit, as we saw above.

Besides, Dream Office Real Estate Investment Trust has been paying dividends for at least ten years or more. This shows that the company is committed to sharing profits with its shareholders.

Summary

In total, we are pretty happy with Dream Office Real Estate Investment Trust's performance. Especially the high ROE, Which has contributed to the impressive growth seen in earnings. Despite the company reinvesting only a small portion of its profits, it still has managed to grow its earnings so that is appreciable. So far, we've only made a quick discussion around the company's earnings growth. So it may be worth checking this free detailed graph of Dream Office Real Estate Investment Trust's past earnings, as well as revenue and cash flows to get a deeper insight into the company's performance.

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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