Shareholders Would Enjoy A Repeat Of IES Holdings' (NASDAQ:IESC) Recent Growth In Returns
Finding a business that has the potential to grow substantially is not easy, but it is possible if we look at a few key financial metrics. Typically, we'll want to notice a trend of growing return on capital employed (ROCE) and alongside that, an expanding base 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. So when we looked at the ROCE trend of IES Holdings (NASDAQ:IESC) we really liked what we saw.
What Is Return On Capital Employed (ROCE)?
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. To calculate this metric for IES Holdings, this is the formula:
Return on Capital Employed = Earnings Before Interest and Tax (EBIT) ÷ (Total Assets - Current Liabilities)
0.22 = US$118m ÷ (US$900m - US$370m) (Based on the trailing twelve months to June 2023).
Therefore, IES Holdings has an ROCE of 22%. In absolute terms that's a great return and it's even better than the Construction industry average of 9.8%.
Check out our latest analysis for IES Holdings
Historical performance is a great place to start when researching a stock so above you can see the gauge for IES Holdings' ROCE against it's prior returns. If you're interested in investigating IES Holdings' past further, check out this free graph of past earnings, revenue and cash flow.
What Can We Tell From IES Holdings' ROCE Trend?
The trends we've noticed at IES Holdings are quite reassuring. The numbers show that in the last five years, the returns generated on capital employed have grown considerably to 22%. The company is effectively making more money per dollar of capital used, and it's worth noting that the amount of capital has increased too, by 109%. This can indicate that there's plenty of opportunities to invest capital internally and at ever higher rates, a combination that's common among multi-baggers.
Another thing to note, IES Holdings has a high ratio of current liabilities to total assets of 41%. This effectively means that suppliers (or short-term creditors) are funding a large portion of the business, so just be aware that this can introduce some elements of risk. Ideally we'd like to see this reduce as that would mean fewer obligations bearing risks.
In Conclusion...
In summary, it's great to see that IES Holdings can compound returns by consistently reinvesting capital at increasing rates of return, because these are some of the key ingredients of those highly sought after multi-baggers. Since the stock has returned a staggering 263% to shareholders over the last five years, it looks like investors are recognizing these changes. Therefore, we think it would be worth your time to check if these trends are going to continue.
Before jumping to any conclusions though, we need to know what value we're getting for the current share price. That's where you can check out our FREE intrinsic value estimation that compares the share price and estimated value.
If you'd like to see other companies earning high returns, check out our free list of companies earning high returns with solid balance sheets here.
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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.
