There are a few key trends to look for if we want to identify the next multi-bagger. 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. This shows us that it's a compounding machine, able to continually reinvest its earnings back into the business and generate higher returns. Although, when we looked at Atrion (NASDAQ:ATRI), it didn't seem to tick all of these boxes.

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. Analysts use this formula to calculate it for Atrion:

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

0.13 = US$33m ÷ (US$269m - US$11m) (Based on the trailing twelve months to March 2021).

So, Atrion has an ROCE of 13%. In absolute terms, that's a satisfactory return, but compared to the Medical Equipment industry average of 8.7% it's much better.

View our latest analysis for Atrion

Historical performance is a great place to start when researching a stock so above you can see the gauge for Atrion's ROCE against it's prior returns. If you'd like to look at how Atrion has performed in the past in other metrics, you can view this free graph of past earnings, revenue and cash flow.

So How Is Atrion's ROCE Trending?

On the surface, the trend of ROCE at Atrion doesn't inspire confidence. Over the last five years, returns on capital have decreased to 13% from 26% five years ago. On the other hand, the company has been employing more capital without a corresponding improvement in sales in the last year, which could suggest these investments are longer term plays. It's worth keeping an eye on the company's earnings from here on to see if these investments do end up contributing to the bottom line.

The Key Takeaway

Bringing it all together, while we're somewhat encouraged by Atrion's reinvestment in its own business, we're aware that returns are shrinking. And with the stock having returned a mere 39% in the last five years to shareholders, you could argue that they're aware of these lackluster trends. Therefore, if you're looking for a multi-bagger, we'd propose looking at other options.

Atrion could be trading at an attractive price in other respects, so you might find our free intrinsic value estimation on our platform quite valuable.

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.

This article by Simply Wall St is general in nature. 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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