: Return on asset (ROA) value for a stock is reported differently on Yahoo Finance and MarketWatch I am wondering why the return on asset (ROA) is so much different for a company when reported on Yahoo finance and Market watch

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Why there is this huge difference?

I am not able to reconcile Yahoo's answer of 5.75%, even using their definition for ROA of:

Return on Assets

Formula: Earnings from Continuing Operations / Average Total Equity

This ratio shows percentage of Returns to Total Assets of the company.
This is a useful measure in analyzing how well a company uses its
assets to produce earnings.

I suspect the "Average Total Equity" in their formula is a typo, but using either measure I cannot come up with 5.75% for any 12-month period.

I can, however, match MarketWatch's answer by looking at the 2016 fiscal year totals and using a "traditional" formula of Net Income / Average Total Assets:

2016FY 2015FY
Total Assets 394.34 226.71
Net Income 120.78 16.88
ROA 38.90%

I'm NOT saying that MatketWatch is right and Yahoo is wrong - MW is using fiscal year totals while Yahoo is using trailing 12-month numbers, and Yahoo uses "Earnings from Continuing Operations", but even using that number (which Yahoo calculates) I am not able to reconcile the 5.75% they give.

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IESC has a one-time, non-repeatable event in its operating income stream. It magnifies operating income by about a factor of five. It impacts both the numerator and the denominator. Without knowing exactly how the adjustments are made it would take too much work for me to calculate it exactly, but I did get close to their number using a relatively crude adjustment rule.

Basically, Yahoo is excluding one-time events from its definitions since, although they are classified as operating events, they distort the financial record. I teach securities analysis and have done it as a profession. If I had to choose between Yahoo and Marketwatch, at least for this security, I would clearly choose Yahoo.