Did you know there are some financial metrics that can provide clues of a potential 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. Basically this means that a company has profitable initiatives that it can continue to reinvest in, which is a trait of a compounding machine. Although, when we looked at Privia Health Group (NASDAQ:PRVA), it didn't seem to tick all of these boxes.

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

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. To calculate this metric for Privia Health Group, this is the formula:

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

0.024 = US$15m ÷ (US$1.0b - US$404m) (Based on the trailing twelve months to March 2024).

So, Privia Health Group has an ROCE of 2.4%. In absolute terms, that's a low return and it also under-performs the Healthcare industry average of 11%.

Above you can see how the current ROCE for Privia Health Group compares to its prior returns on capital, but there's only so much you can tell from the past. If you'd like to see what analysts are forecasting going forward, you should check out our free analyst report for Privia Health Group .

How Are Returns Trending?

The trend of ROCE doesn't look fantastic because it's fallen from 3.7% five years ago, while the business's capital employed increased by 319%. Usually this isn't ideal, but given Privia Health Group conducted a capital raising before their most recent earnings announcement, that would've likely contributed, at least partially, to the increased capital employed figure. The funds raised likely haven't been put to work yet so it's worth watching what happens in the future with Privia Health Group's earnings and if they change as a result from the capital raise.

The Bottom Line On Privia Health Group's ROCE

Even though returns on capital have fallen in the short term, we find it promising that revenue and capital employed have both increased for Privia Health Group. These growth trends haven't led to growth returns though, since the stock has fallen 58% over the last three years. So we think it'd be worthwhile to look further into this stock given the trends look encouraging.

On a final note, we've found 1 warning sign for Privia Health Group that we think you should be aware of.

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.