If you're looking for a multi-bagger, there's a few things to keep an eye out for. 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. In light of that, when we looked at Kuangda Technology Group (SZSE:002516) and its ROCE trend, we weren't exactly thrilled.

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

For those that aren't sure what ROCE is, it measures the amount of pre-tax profits a company can generate from the capital employed in its business. Analysts use this formula to calculate it for Kuangda Technology Group:

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

0.058 = CN¥215m ÷ (CN¥4.2b - CN¥571m) (Based on the trailing twelve months to September 2023).

Therefore, Kuangda Technology Group has an ROCE of 5.8%. In absolute terms, that's a low return but it's around the Luxury industry average of 5.1%.

See our latest analysis for Kuangda Technology Group

Historical performance is a great place to start when researching a stock so above you can see the gauge for Kuangda Technology Group's ROCE against it's prior returns. If you're interested in investigating Kuangda Technology Group's past further, check out this free graph of past earnings, revenue and cash flow.

How Are Returns Trending?

There hasn't been much to report for Kuangda Technology Group's returns and its level of capital employed because both metrics have been steady for the past five years. It's not uncommon to see this when looking at a mature and stable business that isn't re-investing its earnings because it has likely passed that phase of the business cycle. So unless we see a substantial change at Kuangda Technology Group in terms of ROCE and additional investments being made, we wouldn't hold our breath on it being a multi-bagger.

The Bottom Line

We can conclude that in regards to Kuangda Technology Group's returns on capital employed and the trends, there isn't much change to report on. Although the market must be expecting these trends to improve because the stock has gained 76% over the last five years. However, unless these underlying trends turn more positive, we wouldn't get our hopes up too high.

If you want to continue researching Kuangda Technology Group, you might be interested to know about the 1 warning sign that our analysis has discovered.

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.