Biotechnology company Ginkgo Bioworks is standing out today, surging to $2.13 and marking a 6.2% change. In comparison the S&P 500 moved only 1.0%. As such, the average analyst rates it at buy. Over the last year, Ginkgo Bioworks has underperfomed the S&P 500 by 5376.0%, moving -3699.1%.
Ginkgo Bioworks Holdings, Inc., together with its subsidiaries, develops platform for cell programming. The company is part of the healthcare sector. Healthcare companies work in incredibly complex markets, and their valuations can change in an instant based on a denied drug approval, a research and development breakthrough at a competitor, or a new government regulation. In the longer term, healthcare companies are affected by factors as varied as demographics and epidemiology. Investors who want to understand the healthcare market should be prepared for deep dives into a wide range of topics.
Ginkgo Bioworks does not publish either its forward or trailing P/E ratios because their values are negative -- meaning that each share of stock represents a net earnings loss. But we can calculate these P/E ratios anyways using the stocks forward and trailing (EPS) values of $-0.23 and $-0.99. We can see that DNA has a forward P/E ratio of -9.3 and a trailing P/E ratio of -2.2.
The P/E ratio is the company's share price divided by its earnings per share. In other words, it represents how much investors are willing to spend for each dollar of the company's earnings (revenues minus the cost of goods sold, taxes, and overhead). As of the first quarter of 2023, the health care sector has an average P/E ratio of 24.45, and the average for the S&P 500 is 15.97.
The main limitation with P/E ratios is that they don't take into account the growth of earnings. This means that a company with a higher than average P/E ratio may still be undervalued if it has high projected earnings growth. Conversely, a company with a low P/E ratio may not present a good value proposition if its projected earnings are stagnant.
When we divide Ginkgo Bioworks's P/E ratio by its projected 5 year earnings growth rate, we obtain its Price to Earnings Growth (PEG) ratio of -0.1. Since a PEG ratio of 1 or less may indicate that the company's valuation is proportionate to its growth potential, we see here that investors are undervaluing DNA's growth potential .
To better understand the strength of Ginkgo Bioworks's business, we can analyse its operating margins, which are its revenues minus its operating costs. Consistently strong margins backed by a positive trend can signal that a company is on track to deliver returns for its shareholders. Here's the operating margin statistics for the last four years:
| Date Reported | Total Revenue ($ k) | Operating Expenses ($ k) | Operating Margins (%) | YoY Growth (%) |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| 2022-12-31 | 477,706 | 2,482,442 | -462.41 | 20.63 |
| 2021-12-31 | 313,837 | 2,012,614 | -582.62 | -225.94 |
| 2020-12-31 | 76,657 | 198,073 | -178.75 | -35.27 |
| 2019-12-31 | 54,184 | 125,782 | -132.14 | n/a |
- Average operating margins: -339.0 %
- Average operating margins growth rate: -36.8 %
- Coefficient of variability (lower numbers indicate less volatility): 64.4 %
Another key to assessing a company's health is to look at its free cash flow, which is calculated on the basis of its total cash flow from operating activities minus its capital expenditures. Capital expenditures are the costs of maintaining fixed assets such as land, buildings, and equipment. From Ginkgo Bioworks's last four annual reports, we are able to obtain the following rundown of its free cash flow:
| Date Reported | Cash Flow from Operations ($ k) | Capital expenditures ($ k) | Free Cashflow ($ k) | YoY Growth (%) |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| 2022-12-31 | -252,198 | -52,271 | -304,469 | 1.89 |
| 2021-12-31 | -253,818 | -56,521 | -310,339 | -60.26 |
| 2020-12-31 | -135,830 | -57,821 | -193,651 | -189.54 |
| 2019-12-31 | -44,663 | -22,219 | -66,882 | n/a |
- Average free cash flow: $-218835250.0
- Average free cash flown growth rate: -46.1 %
- Coefficient of variability (the lower the better): 52.4 %
If it weren't negative, the free cash flow would represent the amount of money available for reinvestment in the business, or for payments to equity investors in the form of a dividend. While a negative cash flow for one or two quarters is not a sign of financial troubles for DNA, a long term trend of negative or highly erratic cash flow levels may indicate a struggling business or a mismanaged company.
Value investors often analyze stocks through the lens of its Price to Book (P/B) Ratio (market value divided by book value). The book value refers to the present value of the company if the company were to sell off all of its assets and pay all of its debts today - a number whose value may differ significantly depending on the accounting method.
Ginkgo Bioworks has a P/B ratio of 2.75. This indicates that the market value of the company exceeds its book value by a factor of more than 2, but is still below the average P/B ratio of the Health Care sector, which stood at 4.16 as of the first quarter of 2023.
With a negative P/E ratio, a lower P/B ratio than its sector average, and negative and highly variable cash flows with a downwards trend, we can conclude that Ginkgo Bioworks is probably overvalued at current prices. The stock presents poor growth indicators because of its consistently negative margins with a negative growth trend, and a negative PEG ratio.
