About Southern Company (The)
Southern Company (The) (SO) is a Utilities company in the Electric Services industry with a market capitalisation of $95.5B. The stock trades at 20.17x trailing earnings and yields 3.58%.
- Sector
- Utilities
- Industry
- Electric Services
- Market cap
- $95.5B
- P/E ratio
- 20.17
- EPS (TTM)
- $3.92
- Revenue (TTM)
- $29.6B
- Free cash flow
- -$2.9B
- Profit margin
- 14.7%
- Dividend yield
- 3.58%
- Shares outstanding
- 1.1B
Financial health: Fair5/10
3 strengths, 3 concerns. Weakest points: current ratio, free cash flow, earnings growth.
- Current ratio: 0.65 (Concern, benchmark > 1.5) — Short-term assets cover only 0.65x short-term liabilities — below 1.0, meaning bills due this year exceed the assets on hand to pay them. It has been broadly flat over the last 4 years.
- Return on equity: 12.0% (Watch, benchmark > 15%) — Earns 12.0% on shareholder equity, short of the > 15% mark.
- Gross margin: 48.3% (Strong, benchmark > 40%) — Keeps 48.3% of revenue after the direct cost of sales, comfortably past the > 40% mark.
- Net margin: 14.7% (Strong, benchmark > 10%) — Turns 14.7% of revenue into profit, comfortably past the > 10% mark.
- Free cash flow: -$2.9B (Concern, benchmark positive) — Burned $2.9B of cash after capital spending, so operations did not fund themselves. It has deteriorated over the last 4 years.
- Revenue growth: 10.6% (Strong, benchmark > 10%) — Revenue changed 10.6% year on year, comfortably past the > 10% mark.
- Earnings growth: -1.4% (Concern, benchmark > 10%) — Earnings changed -1.4% year on year, well short of the > 10% mark.
- Payout ratio: 69.5% (Watch, benchmark < 60%) — Pays out 69.5% of earnings as dividends — above the level usually considered sustainable.