Thanks Woolydog.
I use Commsec as well and used end of FY price in the SP / EPS calculation. I believe, Commsec gives an average multiple per year, i.e. averaged during that year. I am unable to say, which prices make up the average price that they use, but assume it is a price averaged over the year.
If a share price is going up consistently, or say most of the time, then the average share price is lower than the end of year share price. A lower average share price divided by earnings, then leads to a lower earnings multiples.
I guess, their method gives average (say midpoint of period) multiples, I calculated end of period multiples.
I believe, latest prices for the relevant period would be more informative than average, because - at least in theory - the current price reflects all current and expected information (not so much the price from say 11 months ago)
Similarly, if a share is on a downtrend, it would be less informative if one would compute data from when the price was much higher, say, 12 months earlier. In consistent downtrend, I guess, Commsec would produce higher multiples than I would with my methodology.
Best would be forward looking price / data points. But who would have them with any reliability.
Just thinking...
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