Using
the measure of tangible book value per share penalizes acquisitive companies, unless they can buy companies for less than their tangible book value per share.
Not exact matches
Because
of our conservative accounting,
tangible book value is a very good
measure of the growth
of the
value of our company.
A more consistent
measure of value is our
tangible book value, which has had healthy growth over time.
All
measures like the growth in
tangible book value per share become considerably more complicated to evaluate when a company grows via a series
of mergers.
Alright, I took a look at my
books and I was mistaken, they actually make an argument that
tangible book value is not always an accurate
measure, especially in the case when the intangibles can be sold off in the case
of a patent, rights, or copyright.
If your assets and liabilities are properly
valued, if your accounting is appropriately conservative, if you have real earnings without taking excessive risk and if you have strong franchises with defensible margins,
tangible book value should be a very conservative
measure of value.
Our
tangible book value per share is a good, very conservative
measure of share - holder
value.
So, that's my preferred
measure for how much has the underlying
value of the firm increased: growth in fully diluted
tangible book value (ex-AOCI), adding back dividends, and subtract out net equity issuance / buyback
measured not at cost, but at the current market price.
Growth in fully diluted
tangible book value (ex-AOCI) is a good
measure of firm performance, if you add back dividends, and subtract out net equity issuance / buyback
measured not at cost, but at the current market price.