Did you know there are some financial metrics that can provide clues of a potential multi-bagger? Firstly, we'll want to see a proven return on capital employed (ROCE) that is increasing, and secondly, an expanding base of capital employed. If you see this, it typically means it's a company with a great business model and plenty of profitable reinvestment opportunities. With that in mind, the ROCE of XMH Holdings (SGX:BQF) looks great, so lets see what the trend can tell us.

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 XMH Holdings:

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

0.33 = S$25m ÷ (S$162m - S$88m) (Based on the trailing twelve months to October 2024).

Therefore, XMH Holdings has an ROCE of 33%. That's a fantastic return and not only that, it outpaces the average of 5.7% earned by companies in a similar industry.

See our latest analysis for XMH Holdings

Historical performance is a great place to start when researching a stock so above you can see the gauge for XMH Holdings' ROCE against it's prior returns. If you'd like to look at how XMH Holdings has performed in the past in other metrics, you can view this free graph of XMH Holdings' past earnings, revenue and cash flow.

We're delighted to see that XMH Holdings is reaping rewards from its investments and has now broken into profitability. Historically the company was generating losses but as we can see from the latest figures referenced above, they're now earning 33% on their capital employed. In regards to capital employed, XMH Holdings is using 24% less capital than it was five years ago, which on the surface, can indicate that the business has become more efficient at generating these returns. The reduction could indicate that the company is selling some assets, and considering returns are up, they appear to be selling the right ones.

For the record though, there was a noticeable increase in the company's current liabilities over the period, so we would attribute some of the ROCE growth to that. The current liabilities has increased to 54% of total assets, so the business is now more funded by the likes of its suppliers or short-term creditors. And with current liabilities at those levels, that's pretty high.

From what we've seen above, XMH Holdings has managed to increase it's returns on capital all the while reducing it's capital base. And with the stock having performed exceptionally well over the last five years, these patterns are being accounted for by investors. Therefore, we think it would be worth your time to check if these trends are going to continue.