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. Basically this means that a company has profitable initiatives that it can continue to reinvest in, which is a trait of a compounding machine. And in light of that, the trends we're seeing at Anglo Asian Mining's (LON:AAZ) look very promising so lets take 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. Analysts use this formula to calculate it for Anglo Asian Mining:

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

0.21 = US$32m ÷ (US$197m - US$42m) (Based on the trailing twelve months to June 2020).

Therefore, Anglo Asian Mining has an ROCE of 21%. That's a fantastic return and not only that, it outpaces the average of 14% earned by companies in a similar industry.

View our latest analysis for Anglo Asian Mining

Above you can see how the current ROCE for Anglo Asian Mining 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 Anglo Asian Mining here for free.

The Trend Of ROCE

Shareholders will be relieved that Anglo Asian Mining has broken into profitability. The company now earns 21% on its capital, because five years ago it was incurring losses. On top of that, what's interesting is that the amount of capital being employed has remained steady, so the business hasn't needed to put any additional money to work to generate these higher returns. With no noticeable increase in capital employed, it's worth knowing what the company plans on doing going forward in regards to reinvesting and growing the business. After all, a company can only become a long term multi-bagger if it continually reinvests in itself at high rates of return.

What We Can Learn From Anglo Asian Mining's ROCE

In summary, we're delighted to see that Anglo Asian Mining has been able to increase efficiencies and earn higher rates of return on the same amount of capital. And a remarkable 2,254% total return over the last five years tells us that investors are expecting more good things to come in the future. Therefore, we think it would be worth your time to check if these trends are going to continue.