Returns At Korea Industrial (KRX:002140) Are On The Way Up

To find a multi-bagger stock, what are the underlying trends we should look for in a business? 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. This shows us that it's a compounding machine, able to continually reinvest its earnings back into the business and generate higher returns. So when we looked at Korea Industrial (KRX:002140) and its trend of ROCE, we really liked what we saw.

Return On Capital Employed (ROCE): What Is It?

For those who don't know, ROCE is a measure of a company's yearly pre-tax profit (its return), relative to the capital employed in the business. To calculate this metric for Korea Industrial, this is the formula:

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

0.062 = ₩7.9b ÷ (₩289b - ₩161b) (Based on the trailing twelve months to June 2024).

Thus, Korea Industrial has an ROCE of 6.2%. On its own, that's a low figure but it's around the 7.4% average generated by the Food industry.

Check out our latest analysis for Korea Industrial

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 , check out these free graphs detailing revenue and cash flow performance of Korea Industrial.

What Does the ROCE Trend For Korea Industrial Tell Us?

Korea Industrial's ROCE growth is quite impressive. More specifically, while the company has kept capital employed relatively flat over the last five years, the ROCE has climbed 186% in that same time. So our take on this is that the business has increased efficiencies to generate these higher returns, all the while not needing to make any additional investments. On that front, things are looking good so it's worth exploring what management has said about growth plans going forward.

Another thing to note, Korea Industrial has a high ratio of current liabilities to total assets of 56%. This effectively means that suppliers (or short-term creditors) are funding a large portion of the business, so just be aware that this can introduce some elements of risk. Ideally we'd like to see this reduce as that would mean fewer obligations bearing risks.

Our Take On Korea Industrial's ROCE

To sum it up, Korea Industrial is collecting higher returns from the same amount of capital, and that's impressive. Given the stock has declined 23% in the last five years, this could be a good investment if the valuation and other metrics are also appealing. With that in mind, we believe the promising trends warrant this stock for further investigation.

If you'd like to know more about Korea Industrial, we've spotted 3 warning signs, and 2 of them shouldn't be ignored.

If you want to search for solid companies with great earnings, check out this free list of companies with good balance sheets and impressive 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.