The Return Trends At Nippon Pallet Pool (TYO:4690) Look Promising

If you're not sure where to start when looking for the next multi-bagger, there are a few key trends you should keep an eye out for. Amongst other things, we'll want to see two things; firstly, a growing return on capital employed (ROCE) and secondly, an expansion in the company's amount of capital employed. Ultimately, this demonstrates that it's a business that is reinvesting profits at increasing rates of return. Speaking of which, we noticed some great changes in Nippon Pallet Pool's (TYO:4690) returns on capital, so let's have a look.

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. To calculate this metric for Nippon Pallet Pool, this is the formula:

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

0.092 = JP¥659m ÷ (JP¥10b - JP¥3.0b) (Based on the trailing twelve months to December 2020).

Therefore, Nippon Pallet Pool has an ROCE of 9.2%. On its own that's a low return, but compared to the average of 6.3% generated by the Trade Distributors industry, it's much better.

View our latest analysis for Nippon Pallet Pool

While the past is not representative of the future, it can be helpful to know how a company has performed historically, which is why we have this chart above. If you want to delve into the historical earnings, revenue and cash flow of Nippon Pallet Pool, check out these free graphs here.

The Trend Of ROCE

Nippon Pallet Pool is showing promise given that its ROCE is trending up and to the right. Looking at the data, we can see that even though capital employed in the business has remained relatively flat, the ROCE generated has risen by 296% over the last five years. Basically the business is generating higher returns from the same amount of capital and that is proof that there are improvements in the company's efficiencies. It's worth looking deeper into this though because while it's great that the business is more efficient, it might also mean that going forward the areas to invest internally for the organic growth are lacking.

The Bottom Line

As discussed above, Nippon Pallet Pool appears to be getting more proficient at generating returns since capital employed has remained flat but earnings (before interest and tax) are up. Since the stock has returned a solid 74% to shareholders over the last five years, it's fair to say investors are beginning to recognize these changes. 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, we've spotted 2 warning signs facing Nippon Pallet Pool that you might find interesting.

While Nippon Pallet Pool isn't earning the highest return, check out this free list of companies that are earning high returns on equity with solid balance sheets.

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