Investors Met With Slowing Returns on Capital At LaserBond (ASX:LBL)

Did you know there are some financial metrics that can provide clues of a potential multi-bagger? Ideally, a business will show two trends; firstly a growing return on capital employed (ROCE) and secondly, an increasing amount of capital employed. Basically this means that a company has profitable initiatives that it can continue to reinvest in, which is a trait of a compounding machine. So, when we ran our eye over LaserBond's (ASX:LBL) trend of ROCE, we liked what we saw.

Understanding 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. The formula for this calculation on LaserBond is:

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

0.15 = AU$5.3m ÷ (AU$45m - AU$8.8m) (Based on the trailing twelve months to June 2022).

Thus, LaserBond has an ROCE of 15%. On its own, that's a standard return, however it's much better than the 12% generated by the Machinery industry.

View our latest analysis for LaserBond

Above you can see how the current ROCE for LaserBond 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 report on analyst forecasts for the company.

What The Trend Of ROCE Can Tell Us

The trend of ROCE doesn't stand out much, but returns on a whole are decent. The company has employed 342% more capital in the last five years, and the returns on that capital have remained stable at 15%. 15% is a pretty standard return, and it provides some comfort knowing that LaserBond has consistently earned this amount. Stable returns in this ballpark can be unexciting, but if they can be maintained over the long run, they often provide nice rewards to shareholders.

What We Can Learn From LaserBond's ROCE

To sum it up, LaserBond has simply been reinvesting capital steadily, at those decent rates of return. And the stock has done incredibly well with a 605% return over the last five years, so long term investors are no doubt ecstatic with that result. So while the positive underlying trends may be accounted for by investors, we still think this stock is worth looking into further.

If you'd like to know about the risks facing LaserBond, we've discovered 2 warning signs that you should be aware of.

For those who like to invest in solid companies, check out this free list of companies with solid balance sheets and high returns on equity.

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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.