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. 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. If you see this, it typically means it's a company with a great business model and plenty of profitable reinvestment opportunities. So, when we ran our eye over Precio Fishbone's (STO:PRCO B) trend of ROCE, we liked what we saw.
What Is Return On Capital Employed (ROCE)?
Just to clarify if you're unsure, ROCE is a metric for evaluating how much pre-tax income (in percentage terms) a company earns on the capital invested in its business. Analysts use this formula to calculate it for Precio Fishbone:
Return on Capital Employed = Earnings Before Interest and Tax (EBIT) ÷ (Total Assets - Current Liabilities)
0.18 = kr21m ÷ (kr192m - kr71m) (Based on the trailing twelve months to June 2022).
Therefore, Precio Fishbone has an ROCE of 18%. In absolute terms, that's a pretty normal return, and it's somewhat close to the IT industry average of 22%.
Check out the opportunities and risks within the SE IT industry.
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 Precio Fishbone, check out these free graphs here.
What The Trend Of ROCE Can Tell Us
While the current returns on capital are decent, they haven't changed much. The company has employed 28% more capital in the last five years, and the returns on that capital have remained stable at 18%. Since 18% is a moderate ROCE though, it's good to see a business can continue to reinvest at these decent rates of return. 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.
The Key Takeaway
To sum it up, Precio Fishbone has simply been reinvesting capital steadily, at those decent rates of return. On top of that, the stock has rewarded shareholders with a remarkable 171% return to those who've held over the last five years. So while the positive underlying trends may be accounted for by investors, we still think this stock is worth looking into further.
One final note, you should learn about the 2 warning signs we've spotted with Precio Fishbone (including 1 which is concerning) .
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.
About OM:PRCO B
Precio Fishbone
Provides Microsoft-based solutions for the private and public sectors in Sweden, Denmark, the United Kingdom, Canada, and Vietnam.
Flawless balance sheet established dividend payer.