Tenaga Nasional Berhad (KLSE:TENAGA) May Have Issues Allocating Its Capital

If we want to find a potential multi-bagger, often there are underlying trends that can provide clues. 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. In light of that, when we looked at Tenaga Nasional Berhad (KLSE:TENAGA) and its ROCE trend, we weren't exactly thrilled.

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 Tenaga Nasional Berhad, this is the formula:

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

0.055 = RM8.2b ÷ (RM177b - RM27b) (Based on the trailing twelve months to June 2021).

Therefore, Tenaga Nasional Berhad has an ROCE of 5.5%. In absolute terms, that's a low return but it's around the Electric Utilities industry average of 5.3%.

See our latest analysis for Tenaga Nasional Berhad

In the above chart we have measured Tenaga Nasional Berhad's prior ROCE against its prior performance, but the future is arguably more important. If you'd like, you can check out the forecasts from the analysts covering Tenaga Nasional Berhad here for free.

So How Is Tenaga Nasional Berhad's ROCE Trending?

In terms of Tenaga Nasional Berhad's historical ROCE movements, the trend isn't fantastic. Around five years ago the returns on capital were 7.7%, but since then they've fallen to 5.5%. On the other hand, the company has been employing more capital without a corresponding improvement in sales in the last year, which could suggest these investments are longer term plays. It's worth keeping an eye on the company's earnings from here on to see if these investments do end up contributing to the bottom line.

The Bottom Line On Tenaga Nasional Berhad's ROCE

In summary, Tenaga Nasional Berhad is reinvesting funds back into the business for growth but unfortunately it looks like sales haven't increased much just yet. And investors appear hesitant that the trends will pick up because the stock has fallen 10% in the last five years. In any case, the stock doesn't have these traits of a multi-bagger discussed above, so if that's what you're looking for, we think you'd have more luck elsewhere.

If you'd like to know more about Tenaga Nasional Berhad, we've spotted 2 warning signs, and 1 of them makes us a bit uncomfortable.

While Tenaga Nasional Berhad may not currently earn the highest returns, we've compiled a list of companies that currently earn more than 25% return on equity. Check out this free list here.

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.

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