Insurance companies could be an attractive addition to an investment portfolio, offering a good balance of capital appreciation and dividends. Similar to other financial services firms, valuing insurance companies poses difficulties to analysts due to small capital expenditures and deprec𝔍iation that have little effect on insurers' profitability✃.
Additionally, insurance companies have unique working capital accounts, with a high degree of variability across companies for key account categories, such as premiums receivable and commissions payable, making 澳洲幸运5官方开奖结果体彩网:relative valuation multiples based on working capital ineffective. For these reasons, analysts focus on equity multiples, one of which is the 澳洲幸运5官方开奖结果体彩网:price-to-earnings (P/E) ratio. In January 2021, the average trailing 12 months P/E ratio for general insurance companies with positive earnings was approximately 12.99.
How to Calculate the P/E Ratio
The P/E ratio is calculated as the current market price divided by earnings per share (EPS). There are different variations of this ratio depending on which EPS is used in the denominator. The 澳洲幸运5官方开奖结果体彩网:forward P/E ratio is calculated based on expected EPS in the next 12 months. The trailing-12-month (TTM) P/E ratio is based on earnings for the most recent four quarters. The P/E rat♔io for insurance companies depends on the expected earning🅠s growth, risk, payout and profitability of the insurer.
The insurance industry is divided into several categories including property and casualty, surety and title, accident, health, and life insurance. Each type of business commands its own P/E ratio since there are differences in 澳洲幸运5官方开奖结果体彩网:risk profile and expected earnings growth.
The average P/E ratio should be used with caution since large outliers can greatly influence it by the average. Analysts ordinarily supplement the average P/E ratio with the median P/E ratio. The large difference that🙈 may occur between the average and median is due to a few companies having very large P/E ratios that skew the average statistic.