If we want to find a potential multi-bagger, often there are underlying trends that can provide clues. Ideally, a business will show two trends; firstly a growing return on capital employed (ROCE) and secondly, an increasing amount of capital employed. Put simply, these types of businesses are compounding machines, meaning they are continually reinvesting their earnings at ever-higher rates of return. Having said that, from a first glance at GLG (ASX:GLE) we aren't jumping out of our chairs at how returns are trending, but let's have a deeper look.

Return On Capital Employed (ROCE): What is it?

For those who don't know, ROCE is a measure of a company's yearly pre-tax profit (its return), relative to the capital employed in the business. Analysts use this formula to calculate it for GLG:

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

0.066 = US$5.0m ÷ (US$158m - US$82m) (Based on the trailing twelve months to December 2021).

So, GLG has an ROCE of 6.6%. In absolute terms, that's a low return and it also under-performs the Luxury industry average of 11%.

See our latest analysis for GLG

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 GLG has performed in the past in other metrics, you can view this free graph of past earnings, revenue and cash flow.

The Trend Of ROCE

When we looked at the ROCE trend at GLG, we didn't gain much confidence. Over the last five years, returns on capital have decreased to 6.6% from 9.0% five years ago. However it looks like GLG might be reinvesting for long term growth because while capital employed has increased, the company's sales haven't changed much in the last 12 months. 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.

On a side note, GLG's current liabilities are still rather high at 52% of total assets. This can bring about some risks because the company is basically operating with a rather large reliance on its suppliers or other sorts of short-term creditors. While it's not necessarily a bad thing, it can be beneficial if this ratio is lower.

What We Can Learn From GLG's ROCE

Bringing it all together, while we're somewhat encouraged by GLG's reinvestment in its own business, we're aware that returns are shrinking. Investors must think there's better things to come because the stock has knocked it out of the park, delivering a 117% gain to shareholders who have held over the last three years. Ultimately, if the underlying trends persist, we wouldn't hold our breath on it being a multi-bagger going forward.