The price/earnings (p/e) ratio is one of the most commonly used investing metrics.

There are lots of different ways to evaluate shares. You can look at the share price, the market capitalisation, the net profit, the dividend yield, the net tangible assets (NTA), the return on equity (ROE), the (free) cashflow and so on.

Different sized shares make different amounts of profit. How are you supposed to decide whether Commonwealth Bank of Australia (ASX: CBA) or Telstra Corporation Ltd (ASX: TLS) is cheaper?

The price/earnings ratio allows investors to try to compare different businesses based on how expensive they are compared to their earnings, even if they’re from different industries and there are big market capitalisation differences.

How the price/earnings ratio works

The price/earnings ratio will tell you what multiple the current share price is compared to the earnings.

I’ll try to give you an easy example so you can get your head around it. Imagine there’s a café or shop that makes $100,000 of profit a year after paying for all expenses and costs. How much would you buy that business for? Assuming the business is going to be profitable for the foreseeable future, you’d probably pay more than $100,000. If you’d be willing to pay $300,000 then the business would have a price/earnings ratio of 3.

If that shop had lots of growth potential then perhaps you’d be willing to pay $500,000 or maybe even $1 million. That would be a p/e ratio of 5 or 10.

With big ASX shares like Telstra or Macquarie Group Ltd (ASX: COH), you can do the same sort of calculation. For example, in FY20 Macquarie made $7.645 of diluted earnings per share and it currently has a share price of $122, which translates to a price/earnings ratio of 16. This could also be described as 16x FY20’s earnings.

How to compensate for faster-growing businesses

It starts getting tricky when you try to factor in the growth of a business. You could have one business with a FY20 p/e ratio of 20 and another with a FY20 p/e ratio of 30. One looks a lot more expensive than the other on this year’s earnings.

But what if the second business is projected to double its profit in FY21 and the first doesn’t grow profit at all? Compared to FY21’s future earnings, the first business has a forward p/e ratio of 20 and the second has a forward p/e ratio of 15. The second business now looks cheaper.

If a business is growing at a good pace then you need to think about the estimated earnings of future years, not just the current year.

The positives of using the price/earnings ratio

I like how universal the p/e ratio can be. You can use it to compare a $100 billion giant and a small $100 million company.

The price/earnings ratio is easy to calculate. All you need is the share price and the earnings, which is available in the annual report. For future earnings you’ll have to find an earnings projection or do some estimates yourself, which can be tricky.

Investors should focus on (long-term) profitability, so it’s good to look at a metric that compares profitability of different shares.

The negatives

However, the p/e ratio can be simplistic at times in my opinion.

The accounting profit, and therefore the p/e ratio, can give an impression of excessive profitability. Depreciation is one of the worst types of expenses, the money goes out of the door whilst the deduction takes several years to be fully recognised. Some businesses may end up (legitimately) spreading out the cost of depreciation, which boosts near-term profit. There are some businesses that just fully expense things upfront in their accounts – I respect these companies.

Also, with some businesses you may see revenue recognised quite a long time before the cash is actually received into the bank. There are risks with this. It’s important to look at the ongoing cash conversion. Indeed, some investors just prefer to look at the operating cashflow or the free cashflow rather than the accounting profit.

If you just focus on the p/e ratio you may miss cash generative businesses. Some businesses like Transurban Group (ASX: TCL) and Sydney Airport Holdings Pty Ltd (ASX: SYD) have high annual non-cash costs like depreciation. If you focus on just the profit then you may miss how much annual cash they (normally) produce which can be distributed to shareholders.

The price/earnings ratio doesn’t work well for loss-making businesses – there’s no ‘p’ because there isn’t any profit yet. Avoiding loss-making businesses could mean missing out on a lot of future capital gains. Businesses like Pushpay Holdings Ltd (ASX: PPH) just needed to reach a certain scale before they show very attractive levels of profitability.

Foolish takeaway

I think the price/earnings ratio is a useful metric that can be used to quickly look at most businesses. However, there are some situations where it’s not the best metric to use. It’s also important to understand the relationship between the profit and cashflow for each business. I like to use the forward p/e ratio to assess the valuation of growth shares. 

More reading

• Consider these blue chip ASX shares for strong dividend yields
• How to become a millionaire in 25 years with $20 a day
• ASX 200 up again, ASX retailers make big gains
• The ASX big bank stock with the best forecast dividend yield for the new year
• Brokers just upgraded these ASX 200 stocks to “buy” today

Motley Fool contributor Tristan Harrison has no position in any of the stocks mentioned. The Motley Fool Australia owns shares of and has recommended Macquarie Group Limited, PUSHPAY FPO NZX, and Telstra Limited. The Motley Fool Australia owns shares of Transurban Group. We Fools may not all hold the same opinions, but we all believe that considering a diverse range of insights makes us better investors. The Motley Fool has a disclosure policy. This article contains general investment advice only (under AFSL 400691). Authorised by Scott Phillips.

The post What is the price/earnings (p/e) ratio? appeared first on Motley Fool Australia.

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S&P/ASX 200 Index (ASX: XJO) shares are a great hunting ground to find good opportunities for your portfolio.

To get into the ASX 200 a business must have already shown a sustained period of growth or stability.

There are some very large ASX shares like Westpac Banking Corp (ASX: WBC) and Telstra Corpoation Ltd (ASX: TLS) which are popular but I don’t think they have a lot of growth potential. They are mature businesses which already command a large market share. 

Instead, I think these ASX 200 shares would be good picks next week for the long-term:

Share 1: InvoCare Limited (ASX: IVC)

The funeral operator has seen its share price decline by 24% since the start of its COVID-19 decline. It’s a morbid idea but I think it has solid return potential.

InvoCare has been affected by COVID-19 this year. There’s no doubt about that. The restrictions on funeral numbers will reduce FY20 earnings. But thankfully Australia has only had a small number of coronavirus deaths compared to many other countries.

This probably means that the actual 2020 death rate will be similar to the projected death rate. Death volumes are expected to grow by 1.4% per annum between 2016 to 2025 and then increase by 2.2% per annum from 2025 to 2050. This is a powerful long-term tailwind. 

Indeed, there may even be less deaths in 2020 because of impacts like increased personal hygiene. This is a good thing for the country and for families. For InvoCare, it’s a delay of funeral numbers. But not lost entirely.

The ASX 200 share has a solid dividend record. I think good dividends will continue to flow from InvoCare in future years. With InvoCare, I think investors could see solid total returns with a good dividend yield and steady earnings (and hopefully share price) growth. Its capital raising also improved the strength of the balance sheet.

Interest rates are now incredibly low so bond-like businesses such as InvoCare theoretically should be valued higher.

It’s priced at 19x FY22’s estimated earnings.

Share 2: Brickworks Limited (ASX: BKW)

In my opinion, there are few ASX 200 shares that make more sense than Brickworks in book value terms.

Brickworks currently has a market capitalisation of $2.29 billion. Its industry property trust stake is worth $710 million (growing) and its shareholding of Washington H. Soul Pattinson and Co. Ltd (ASX: SOL) is worth $1.84 billion. Those two divisions have a combined pre-tax value of $2.55 billion.

I like that Brickworks’ dividend is entirely supported by the cash flow paid by those two assets.

However, the rest of the business is also exciting for the long-term. Brickworks recently acquired three brickmakers in the US. That strategy now means that Brickworks is the leading brickmaker in the northeast of the US. America is a huge market and there’s plenty of long-term growth potential for Brickworks, particularly with efficiency gains.

The ASX 200 share is best known for its Australian building product subsidiaries. Bricks, paving, masonry, precast, roofing – it sells a lot of different products.

COVID-19 is probably going to cause the Australian construction sector to have a tough year. But construction is usually cyclical. When immigration returns there is likely to be a bounce back of activity, which would be beneficial for Brickworks. The $25,000 HomeBuilder scheme could also help Brickworks in the shorter-term.

A bonus with Brickworks is that it has one of the best dividend records around. It hasn’t cut its dividend for over 40 years. I think the grossed-up dividend yield of 5.5% looks attractive to me.

Foolish takeaway

I really like the look of both of these ASX 200 shares. Many others may be too expensive considering all of the COVID-19 uncertainty. At the current prices I’d probably go for Brickworks because of its defensive property and investment assets. But I’d happily buy both next week.

More reading

• Why I’m desperate to add CSL and 2 other ASX shares to my portfolio in 2020
• What are the best ASX shares for dividends?
• Top brokers name 3 ASX 200 shares to sell today
• Forget bank interest, try these ASX 200 dividend shares!
• Why G8 Education, InvoCare, Megaport, & Webjet shares are tumbling lower

Motley Fool contributor Tristan Harrison owns shares of Washington H. Soul Pattinson and Company Limited. The Motley Fool Australia owns shares of and has recommended Brickworks, Telstra Limited, and Washington H. Soul Pattinson and Company Limited. The Motley Fool Australia has recommended InvoCare Limited. We Fools may not all hold the same opinions, but we all believe that considering a diverse range of insights makes us better investors. The Motley Fool has a disclosure policy. This article contains general investment advice only (under AFSL 400691). Authorised by Scott Phillips.

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Interest rates look set to remain at historic lows, at least for the next few years. So, keeping your money in a high-interest savings account or a term deposit will barely keep up with inflation. Maybe you’re currently in or nearing retirement, or maybe you are still working and just looking for a handy way to supplement your income stream?

Either way, here are 3 blue chip ASX shares to consider for strong dividend yields: Macquarie Group Ltd (ASX: MQG), Wesfarmers Ltd (ASX: WES) and Telstra Corporation Ltd (ASX: TLS).

All 3 of these companies pay attractive dividends and are well-positioned for long term growth.

Macquarie

Macquarie is a global financial services business with a core focus on international investment banking.

In terms of ASX listed blue chip shares to select from, I definitely prefer Macquarie over Australia’s big 4 major banks: Commonwealth Bank of Australia (ASX: CBA), Westpac Banking Corp (ASX: WBC), National Australia Bank Ltd. (ASX: NAB) and Australia and New Zealand Banking GrpLtd (ASX: ANZ).

I’m more attracted to Macquarie due to the quality and diversity of its earnings base. In particular, it is less exposed to downturns in the local residential property market. It could be quite a rocky road ahead for this sector over the next few months.

Macquarie currently provides investors with a forward fully franked dividend yield of 3.59%.

Wesfarmers

Wesfarmers is a highly diversified business. It has operations in retail segments including general merchandise and office supplies. It also has exposure to the industrial sector with operations in energy and fertilisers, and industrial and safety products.

This high level of diversification across a broad spectrum of the Australian economy is the core strength of this blue chip ASX share.

Wesfarmers business performance during the coronavirus pandemic has been stronger than most. It revealed in early June that it has experienced particularly strong demand from both its Bunnings and Officeworks stores.

Also, Wesfarmers offers investors a forward fully franked dividend yield of around 3.55% right now.

Telstra

Another blue chip ASX share I would consider buying now for strong dividend yield is Australia’s largest telco provider, Telstra. It currently offers investors a handy forward fully franked dividend yield of around 3.1%.

Telstra has been restructuring into a leaner company, so it can remain in a dominant no. 1 market position. Telstra also has had to absorb increased investments in its 5G network to gain an upper hand in this emerging market. However, these investments are now paying off. It is currently a world leader in terms of 5G network rollouts.

I believe that 5G could be a real game-changer for Telstra. The 5G network has the potential to offer even faster broadband speeds than the NBN.

More reading

• 2 blue chip ASX 200 dividend shares to buy next week
• What is the price/earnings (p/e) ratio?
• The ASX big bank stock with the best forecast dividend yield for the new year
• Australian retail sales up 16.3% in May
• Brokers just upgraded these ASX 200 stocks to “buy” today

Motley Fool contributor Phil Harpur owns shares of Australia & New Zealand Banking Group Limited, Commonwealth Bank of Australia, Telstra Limited, and Westpac Banking. The Motley Fool Australia owns shares of and has recommended Macquarie Group Limited and Telstra Limited. The Motley Fool Australia owns shares of Wesfarmers Limited. We Fools may not all hold the same opinions, but we all believe that considering a diverse range of insights makes us better investors. The Motley Fool has a disclosure policy. This article contains general investment advice only (under AFSL 400691). Authorised by Scott Phillips.

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