Serinus Energy (LON:SENX) Shareholders Will Want The ROCE Trajectory To Continue
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. 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. Basically this means that a company has profitable initiatives that it can continue to reinvest in, which is a trait of a compounding machine. Speaking of which, we noticed some great changes in Serinus Energy's (LON:SENX) returns on capital, so let's have a look.
Return On Capital Employed (ROCE): What Is It?
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 Serinus Energy:
Return on Capital Employed = Earnings Before Interest and Tax (EBIT) ÷ (Total Assets - Current Liabilities)
0.11 = US$8.4m ÷ (US$93m - US$19m) (Based on the trailing twelve months to September 2022).
Therefore, Serinus Energy has an ROCE of 11%. That's a pretty standard return and it's in line with the industry average of 11%.
See our latest analysis for Serinus Energy
In the above chart we have measured Serinus Energy'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 report on analyst forecasts for the company.
What Does the ROCE Trend For Serinus Energy Tell Us?
Shareholders will be relieved that Serinus Energy has broken into profitability. While the business was unprofitable in the past, it's now turned things around and is earning 11% on its capital. Interestingly, the capital employed by the business has remained relatively flat, so these higher returns are either from prior investments paying off or increased efficiencies. So while we're happy that the business is more efficient, just keep in mind that could mean that going forward the business is lacking areas to invest internally for growth. So if you're looking for high growth, you'll want to see a business's capital employed also increasing.
The Key Takeaway
In summary, we're delighted to see that Serinus Energy has been able to increase efficiencies and earn higher rates of return on the same amount of capital. However the stock is down a substantial 91% in the last three years so there could be other areas of the business hurting its prospects. Still, it's worth doing some further research to see if the trends will continue into the future.
One more thing: We've identified 3 warning signs with Serinus Energy (at least 2 which are concerning) , and understanding them would certainly be useful.
For those who like to invest in solid companies, check out this free list of companies with solid balance sheets and high returns on equity.
Have feedback on this article? Concerned about the content? Get in touch with us directly. Alternatively, email editorial-team (at) simplywallst.com.
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.
Join A Paid User Research Session
You’ll receive a US$30 Amazon Gift card for 1 hour of your time while helping us build better investing tools for the individual investors like yourself. Sign up here
