If you're looking for a multi-bagger, there's a few things to keep an eye out for. 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. So, when we ran our eye over Hologic's (NASDAQ:HOLX) trend of ROCE, we liked what we saw.

Return On Capital Employed (ROCE): What Is It?

If you haven't worked with ROCE before, it measures the 'return' (pre-tax profit) a company generates from capital employed in its business. Analysts use this formula to calculate it for Hologic:

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

0.12 = US$903m ÷ (US$8.7b - US$955m) (Based on the trailing twelve months to March 2024).

Thus, Hologic has an ROCE of 12%. That's a relatively normal return on capital, and it's around the 10% generated by the Medical Equipment industry.

In the above chart we have measured Hologic's prior ROCE against its prior performance, but the future is arguably more important. If you'd like to see what analysts are forecasting going forward, you should check out our free analyst report for Hologic .

The Trend Of ROCE

While the current returns on capital are decent, they haven't changed much. Over the past five years, ROCE has remained relatively flat at around 12% and the business has deployed 42% more capital into its operations. Since 12% is a moderate ROCE though, it's good to see a business can continue to reinvest at these decent rates of return. Over long periods of time, returns like these might not be too exciting, but with consistency they can pay off in terms of share price returns.

The Bottom Line On Hologic's ROCE

The main thing to remember is that Hologic has proven its ability to continually reinvest at respectable rates of return. Therefore it's no surprise that shareholders have earned a respectable 67% return if they held over the last five years. So while the positive underlying trends may be accounted for by investors, we still think this stock is worth looking into further.

One more thing to note, we've identified 2 warning signs with Hologic and understanding them should be part of your investment process.

If you want to search for solid companies with great earnings, check out this free list of companies with good balance sheets and impressive returns on equity.

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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.