There are a few key trends to look for if we want to identify the next 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. 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 looked at GHTLtd (SZSE:300711) and its trend of ROCE, we really liked what we saw.

Understanding 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. The formula for this calculation on GHTLtd is:

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

0.068 = CN¥50m ÷ (CN¥973m - CN¥244m) (Based on the trailing twelve months to March 2024).

So, GHTLtd has an ROCE of 6.8%. In absolute terms, that's a low return, but it's much better than the Communications industry average of 3.9%.

Historical performance is a great place to start when researching a stock so above you can see the gauge for GHTLtd's ROCE against it's prior returns. If you want to delve into the historical earnings , check out these free graphs detailing revenue and cash flow performance of GHTLtd.

So How Is GHTLtd's ROCE Trending?

While in absolute terms it isn't a high ROCE, it's promising to see that it has been moving in the right direction. Over the last five years, returns on capital employed have risen substantially to 6.8%. Basically the business is earning more per dollar of capital invested and in addition to that, 30% more capital is being employed now too. The increasing returns on a growing amount of capital is common amongst multi-baggers and that's why we're impressed.

On a side note, we noticed that the improvement in ROCE appears to be partly fueled by an increase in current liabilities. Effectively this means that suppliers or short-term creditors are now funding 25% of the business, which is more than it was five years ago. It's worth keeping an eye on this because as the percentage of current liabilities to total assets increases, some aspects of risk also increase.

Our Take On GHTLtd's ROCE

In summary, it's great to see that GHTLtd can compound returns by consistently reinvesting capital at increasing rates of return, because these are some of the key ingredients of those highly sought after multi-baggers. Investors may not be impressed by the favorable underlying trends yet because over the last five years the stock has only returned 32% to shareholders. So exploring more about this stock could uncover a good opportunity, if the valuation and other metrics stack up.

One more thing, we've spotted 1 warning sign facing GHTLtd that you might find interesting.

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.

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