Principles of Managerial Finance

66 PART 1 Introduction to Managerial Finance

price/earnings (P/E) ratio
Measures the amount that
investors are willing to pay for
each dollar of a firm’s earnings;
the higher the P/E ratio, the
greater is investor confidence.

market/book (M/B) ratio
Provides an assessment of how
investors view the firm’s perfor-
mance. Firms expected to earn
high returns relative to their risk
typically sell at higher M/B
multiples.

16. Use of the price/earnings ratio to estimate the value of the firm is part of the discussion of “Other approaches to
    common stock valuation” in Chapter 7.

market ratios
Relate a firm’s market value, as
measured by its current share
price, to certain accounting
values.

LG5 2.7 Market Ratios

Market ratiosrelate the firm’s market value, as measured by its current share

price, to certain accounting values. These ratios give insight into how well

investors in the marketplace feel the firm is doing in terms of risk and return.

They tend to reflect, on a relative basis, the common stockholders’ assessment of

all aspects of the firm’s past and expected future performance. Here we consider

two popular market ratios, one that focuses on earnings and another that consid-

ers book value.

Price/Earnings (P/E) Ratio

The price/earnings (P/E) ratiois commonly used to assess the owners’ appraisal

of share value.^16 The P/E ratio measures the amount that investors are willing to

pay for each dollar of a firm’s earnings. The level of the price/earnings ratio indi-

cates the degree of confidence that investors have in the firm’s future perfor-

mance. The higher the P/E ratio, the greater is investor confidence. The P/E ratio

is calculated as follows:

Price/earnings (P/E) ratio

If Bartlett Company’s common stock at the end of 2003 was selling at $32.25,

using the EPS of $2.90, the P/E ratio at year-end 2003 is

11.1

This figure indicates that investors were paying $11.10 for each $1.00 of earn-

ings. The P/E ratio is most informative when applied in cross-sectional analysis

using an industry average P/E ratio or the P/E ratio of a benchmark firm.

Market/Book (M/B) Ratio

The market/book (M/B) ratioprovides an assessment of how investors view the

firm’s performance. It relates the market value of the firm’s shares to their

book—strict accounting—value. To calculate the firm’s M/B ratio, we first need

to find the book value per share of common stock:

Book value per

share of common stock



Substituting the appropriate values for Bartlett Company from its 2003 balance

sheet, we get

Book value per share of common stock$23.00

$1,754,000



76,262

Common stock equity



Number of shares of common stock outstanding

$32.25



$2.90

Market price per share of common stock



Earnings per share