Virtus Health an interesting buy

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This week Money asks stocklight.com for a hot stock pick - Virtus Health (ASX:VRT)

Key statistics:

17/11/15 closing share price: $6.110 52 week high: $8.390

Virtus Health (ASX:VRT)

Most recent dividend: 14.000c

Annual dividend yield: 4.42%

Australian IVF provider Virtus Health offers an interesting buying opportunity, as identified by both StockLight's quantitative analysis and the qualitative research from Intelligent Investor.

One of Australia's leading IVF providers, it reported earnings per share of 37c in the latest annual report with a return on equity of 11.9%. The fundamentals for the business look attractive.

Virtus is the market leader for Australian IVF treatments, holding 37% market share over competitors such as Monash IVF Group (MVF) and Primary Health Care (PRY).

Virtus performed 15,000 fresh IVF cycles in 2014-15, and with an average charge of $2500 to $5000 per cycle they are achieving an average spend of $13,800 per customer.

The expansion into Asia following its recently launched Singapore operation signals further potential upside and revenue from new diagnostic tests is also starting to bear fruit. Virtus also recently purchased a pathology lab in Sydney, which will increase its range of diagnostic offerings.

"Importantly, this acquisition is central to our strategy to continue to grow our diagnostics offering. With a comprehensive pathology service inhouse and a designated diagnostics division, we will enhance our capacity to introduce new genetics-based testing capabilities - such as Next Generation Sequencing - to both internal and external referrers," said chief executive Sue Channon.

Trading at a price earnings (PE) ratio of 17 with a 4.3% dividend yield, Virtus has "green lighted" by eight of the 10 StockLight healthcare ratios. Intelligent Investor has also issued a buy recommendation on the stock.

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Comments
Graeme Lamond
November 18, 2015 1.35pm

The key statistic column has all the relevant info except franking credits.I think that it is important to know whether a share is 100% franked or not.

Money
Verified
November 18, 2015 1.55pm

Thanks for your feedback Graeme. We shall incorporate that information as of next week.