There are a few key trends to look for if we want to identify the next multi-bagger. In a perfect world, we'd like to see a company investing more capital into its business and ideally the returns earned from that capital are also increasing. 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 Edison International (NYSE:EIX), 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. To calculate this metric for Edison International, this is the formula:

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

0.052 = US$3.4b ÷ (US$75b - US$9.3b) (Based on the trailing twelve months to June 2022).

Therefore, Edison International has an ROCE of 5.2%. In absolute terms, that's a low return but it's around the Electric Utilities industry average of 4.4%.

Check out our latest analysis for Edison International

Above you can see how the current ROCE for Edison International compares to its prior returns on capital, but there's only so much you can tell from the past. If you'd like, you can check out the forecasts from the analysts covering Edison International here for free.

The Trend Of ROCE

The returns on capital haven't changed much for Edison International in recent years. The company has employed 37% more capital in the last five years, and the returns on that capital have remained stable at 5.2%. This poor ROCE doesn't inspire confidence right now, and with the increase in capital employed, it's evident that the business isn't deploying the funds into high return investments.

What We Can Learn From Edison International's ROCE

In summary, Edison International has simply been reinvesting capital and generating the same low rate of return as before. And investors may be recognizing these trends since the stock has only returned a total of 5.6% to shareholders over the last five years. Therefore, if you're looking for a multi-bagger, we'd propose looking at other options.

Edison International does have some risks, we noticed 4 warning signs (and 2 which are potentially serious) we think you should know about.

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