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. Amongst other things, we'll want to see two things; firstly, a growing return on capital employed (ROCE) and secondly, an expansion in the company's 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. Speaking of which, we noticed some great changes in Khong Guan's (SGX:K03) returns on capital, so let's have a look.

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. To calculate this metric for Khong Guan, this is the formula:

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

0.039 = S$2.2m ÷ (S$65m - S$8.9m) (Based on the trailing twelve months to January 2024).

Thus, Khong Guan has an ROCE of 3.9%. Ultimately, that's a low return and it under-performs the Consumer Retailing industry average of 6.8%.

See our latest analysis for Khong Guan

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'd like to look at how Khong Guan has performed in the past in other metrics, you can view this free graph of Khong Guan's past earnings, revenue and cash flow.

How Are Returns Trending?

While the ROCE isn't as high as some other companies out there, it's great to see it's on the up. The figures show that over the last five years, ROCE has grown 154% whilst employing roughly the same amount of capital. So our take on this is that the business has increased efficiencies to generate these higher returns, all the while not needing to make any additional investments. The company is doing well in that sense, and it's worth investigating what the management team has planned for long term growth prospects.

What We Can Learn From Khong Guan's ROCE

To sum it up, Khong Guan is collecting higher returns from the same amount of capital, and that's impressive. And since the stock has fallen 40% over the last five years, there might be an opportunity here. With that in mind, we believe the promising trends warrant this stock for further investigation.

If you want to know some of the risks facing Khong Guan we've found 2 warning signs (1 is potentially serious!) that you should be aware of before investing here.

While Khong Guan 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.

Have feedback on this article? Concerned about the content? Get in touch with us directly. Alternatively, email editorial-team (at) simplywallst.com.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.