Cost of retained earnings
/What is the Cost of Retained Earnings?
The cost of retained earnings is the cost to a corporation of funds that it has generated internally. If the funds were not retained internally, they would be paid out to investors in the form of dividends. Therefore, the cost of retained earnings approximates the return that investors expect to earn on their equity investment in the company, which can be derived using the capital asset pricing model (CAPM). The CAPM combines the risk-free rate and a stock’s beta to arrive at the cost of equity capital.