Most analysts love Pacific Gas & Electric Co., which has an average rating of buy. But there's reason to believe the stock may be overvalued at today's price of $16.37 per share. Let's look at the fundamentals ourselves and see if we reach a different conclusion than the analyst community.
The most common valuation metric for stocks is the trailing price to earnings (P/E) ratio. Pacific Gas & Electric Co. has a P/E ratio of 19.3 based on its 12 month trailing earnings per share of $0.85. Considering its future earnings estimates of $1.22 per share, the stock's forward P/E ratio is 13.4. In comparison, the average P/E ratio of the Utilities sector is 26.37 and the average P/E ratio of the S&P 500 is 15.97.
Pacific Gas & Electric Co.'s P/E ratio tells us how much investors are willing to pay for each dollar of the company's earnings. The problem with this metric is that it doesn't take into account the expected growth in earnings of the stock. Sometimes elevated P/E ratios can be justified by equally elevated growth expectations.
We can solve this inconsistency by dividing the company's trailing P/E ratio by its five year earnings growth estimate, which in this case gives us a 3.08 Price to Earnings Growth (PEG) ratio. Since the PEG ratio is greater than 1, the company's lofty valuation is not justified by its growth levels.
We can also compare the ratio of Pacific Gas & Electric Co.'s market price to its book value, which gives us the price to book, or P/B ratio. A company's book value refers to its present liquidation value -- or what would be left if the company sold off all its assets and paid off all of its debts today. Importantly, the book value does not include intangible assets such as the value of its brand and the goodwill of its customers. PCG has a P/B ratio of 1.5, with any figure close to or below one indicating a potentially undervalued company.
A comparison of the share price versus company earnings and book value should be balanced by an analysis of the company's ability to pay its liabilities. One popular metric is the Quick Ratio, or Acid Test, which is the company's current assets minus its inventory and prepaid expenses divided by its current liabilities. Pacific Gas & Electric Co.'s quick ratio is 0.673. Generally speaking, a quick ratio above 1 signifies that the company is able to meet its liabilities.
The last factor we will review in our value analysis of Pacific Gas & Electric Co. is its levered free cash flow, which is negative at $-5,241,000,000.00. The levered free cash flow represents the sum of all of the company's inflows and outflows of capital in the last quarter. A negative value means that Pacific Gas & Electric Co. has no cash left over to re-invest in the business or to pay equity investors in the form of a dividend.
With most indicators pointing at a higher than average valuation with uncertain growth prospects, most analysts are either wrong about Pacific Gas & Electric Co., or their research has uncovered one or more qualitative reasons to invest in the stock. For example, the strength of the management team and their plan for executing the business strategy may have convinced some analysts to give less weight to traditional quantitative factors.
