We Like These Underlying Trends At Agilysys (NASDAQ:AGYS)
What trends should we look for it we want to identify stocks that can multiply in value over the long term? 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 Agilysys' (NASDAQ:AGYS) returns on capital, so let's have a look.
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. The formula for this calculation on Agilysys is:
Return on Capital Employed = Earnings Before Interest and Tax (EBIT) ÷ (Total Assets - Current Liabilities)
0.0089 = US$1.1m ÷ (US$174m - US$46m) (Based on the trailing twelve months to September 2020).
So, Agilysys has an ROCE of 0.9%. Ultimately, that's a low return and it under-performs the Software industry average of 8.9%.
View our latest analysis for Agilysys
Above you can see how the current ROCE for Agilysys compares to its prior returns on capital, but there's only so much you can tell from the past. If you're interested, you can view the analysts predictions in our free report on analyst forecasts for the company.
What The Trend Of ROCE Can Tell Us
Shareholders will be relieved that Agilysys has broken into profitability. The company now earns 0.9% on its capital, because five years ago it was incurring losses. 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. 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.
The Bottom Line On Agilysys' ROCE
As discussed above, Agilysys appears to be getting more proficient at generating returns since capital employed has remained flat but earnings (before interest and tax) are up. And a remarkable 130% total return over the last five years tells us that investors are expecting more good things to come in the future. So given the stock has proven it has promising trends, it's worth researching the company further to see if these trends are likely to persist.
Agilysys does have some risks though, and we've spotted 1 warning sign for Agilysys that you might be interested in.
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.
This article by Simply Wall St is general in nature. 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.
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