We Like DO & CO's (VIE:DOC) Returns And Here's How They're Trending

If we want to find a stock that could multiply over the long term, what are the underlying trends we should look for? In a perfect world, we'd like to see a company investing more capital into its business and ideally the returns earned from that capital are also increasing. Ultimately, this demonstrates that it's a business that is reinvesting profits at increasing rates of return. So when we looked at the ROCE trend of DO & CO (VIE:DOC) we really liked what we saw.

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What Is Return On Capital Employed (ROCE)?

If you haven't worked with ROCE before, it measures the 'return' (pre-tax profit) a company generates from capital employed in its business. Analysts use this formula to calculate it for DO & CO:

Return on Capital Employed = Earnings Before Interest and Tax (EBIT) ÷ (Total Assets - Current Liabilities)

0.27 = €199m ÷ (€1.2b - €460m) (Based on the trailing twelve months to June 2025).

So, DO & CO has an ROCE of 27%. That's a fantastic return and not only that, it outpaces the average of 12% earned by companies in a similar industry.

View our latest analysis for DO & CO

Above you can see how the current ROCE for DO & CO compares to its prior returns on capital, but there's only so much you can tell from the past. If you're interested, you can view the analysts predictions in our free analyst report for DO & CO .

What The Trend Of ROCE Can Tell Us

We're delighted to see that DO & CO is reaping rewards from its investments and has now broken into profitability. The company now earns 27% on its capital, because five years ago it was incurring losses. On top of that, what's interesting is that the amount of capital being employed has remained steady, so the business hasn't needed to put any additional money to work to generate these higher returns. With no noticeable increase in capital employed, it's worth knowing what the company plans on doing going forward in regards to reinvesting and growing the business. So if you're looking for high growth, you'll want to see a business's capital employed also increasing.

What We Can Learn From DO & CO's ROCE

To sum it up, DO & CO is collecting higher returns from the same amount of capital, and that's impressive. And a remarkable 534% total return over the last five years tells us that investors are expecting more good things to come in the future. So given the stock has proven it has promising trends, it's worth researching the company further to see if these trends are likely to persist.

One more thing to note, we've identified 1 warning sign with DO & CO and understanding it should be part of your investment process.

If you'd like to see other companies earning high returns, check out our free list of companies earning high returns with solid balance sheets here.

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This article by Simply Wall St is general in nature. We provide commentary based on historical data and analyst forecasts only using an unbiased methodology and our articles are not intended to be financial advice. It does not constitute a recommendation to buy or sell any stock, and does not take account of your objectives, or your financial situation. We aim to bring you long-term focused analysis driven by fundamental data. Note that our analysis may not factor in the latest price-sensitive company announcements or qualitative material. Simply Wall St has no position in any stocks mentioned.