S&P 500 Aggregate Return on Assets (TTM)

Live value temporarily unavailable.

Source: Company filings (aggregated)

Data updated daily

What it measures

The S&P 500 ROA (return on assets) measures aggregate trailing-twelve-month net income as a percentage of aggregate average total assets for index constituents. It captures how efficiently the index deploys its total asset base — both equity-funded and debt-funded — to generate profits. An ROA of 7% means the index generates $7 of net income per $100 of total assets.

Why it matters

ROA is the cleanest measure of overall asset efficiency because it is neutral to financing choices: unlike ROE, it is not inflated by leverage. A rising ROA driven by genuine margin expansion or higher asset utilization is unambiguously positive. Because total assets include the debt a company carries, declining ROA with rising ROE signals the dangerous pattern of borrowing-to-boost-equity-returns without improving underlying asset productivity. At the sector level, ROA varies enormously — capital-light technology businesses regularly exceed 15%, while capital-intensive industrials operate at fractions of that — so index-level comparisons should be interpreted in the context of sector composition.

How it is calculated

ROA (TTM) = Σ TTM Net Income ÷ Σ Average Total Assets × 100

LENSE computes the S&P 500 ROA as the ratio of aggregate TTM net income to aggregate average total assets — not a simple average of per-company ROAs. Average total assets per constituent is the mean of beginning- and end-of-period total assets from as-reported balance sheets. TTM net income is constructed by summing the four most recently reported fiscal quarters. Constituents with zero average total assets are excluded. Index constituency is resolved point-in-time using point-in-time index constituency.

Recent (monthly)

Recent data unavailable.

Data source: Company filings (aggregated). Computed and published by LENSE Analytics.