Notes:
The sources for all financial data are Hoovers, individual company corporate websites and annual reports. In total, we have cross-analyzed data from 30 companies. The total study includes 40 companies but we have not had consistent data on financial performance on all participants.
For companies (very few) with superior results in one metric and significantly weak measures in another, a deeper analysis of causes to exclude potential one-time effects on the financial measures that could have occurred has been made to be able to position the company in the right group. If not possible, the company was excluded from the analysis.
Technically speaking, a strong performer company was determined as outperforming its industry mean with at least 20% in two of these metrics and is at least within 10% of their respective industry mean in terms of:
- Return on equity
- Revenue growth, last 12 months
- Net income, last 12 months
For companies (very few) with superior results in one metric and significantly weak measures in another, a deeper analysis of causes to exclude potential one-time effects on the financial measures that could have occurred has been made to be able to position the company in the right group. If not possible, the company was excluded from the analysis.
Technically speaking, a strong performer company was determined as outperforming its industry mean with at least 20% in two of these metrics and is at least within 10% of their respective industry mean in terms of:
- Return on equity
- Revenue growth, last 12 months
- Net income, last 12 months
The weaker is underperforming its industry mean by at least 20% in one of the above metrics and not exceeding the mean by 10% limit on the other two.