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. Typically, we'll want to notice a trend of growing return on capital employed (ROCE) and alongside that, an expanding base 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 on that note, J.S. Corrugating Machinery (SZSE:000821) looks quite promising in regards to its trends of return on capital.

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

If you haven't worked with ROCE before, it measures the 'return' (pre-tax profit) a company generates from capital employed in its business. To calculate this metric for J.S. Corrugating Machinery, this is the formula:

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

0.11 = CN¥451m ÷ (CN¥16b - CN¥12b) (Based on the trailing twelve months to September 2023).

Thus, J.S. Corrugating Machinery has an ROCE of 11%. In absolute terms, that's a satisfactory return, but compared to the Machinery industry average of 6.1% it's much better.

In the above chart we have measured J.S. Corrugating Machinery's prior ROCE against its prior performance, but the future is arguably more important. If you're interested, you can view the analysts predictions in our free analyst report for J.S. Corrugating Machinery .

How Are Returns Trending?

The trends we've noticed at J.S. Corrugating Machinery are quite reassuring. The numbers show that in the last five years, the returns generated on capital employed have grown considerably to 11%. The amount of capital employed has increased too, by 25%. So we're very much inspired by what we're seeing at J.S. Corrugating Machinery thanks to its ability to profitably reinvest capital.

On a side note, we noticed that the improvement in ROCE appears to be partly fueled by an increase in current liabilities. Essentially the business now has suppliers or short-term creditors funding about 73% of its operations, which isn't ideal. And with current liabilities at those levels, that's pretty high.

The Bottom Line

In summary, it's great to see that J.S. Corrugating Machinery 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 37% to shareholders. So exploring more about this stock could uncover a good opportunity, if the valuation and other metrics stack up.

Before jumping to any conclusions though, we need to know what value we're getting for the current share price. That's where you can check out our FREE intrinsic value estimation for 000821 that compares the share price and estimated value.

While J.S. Corrugating Machinery isn't earning the highest return, check out this free list of companies that are earning high returns on equity with solid balance sheets.

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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.