Yahoo Finance Victoria (LON:VCP) Could Be Struggling To Allocate Capital
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. Ultimately, this demonstrates that it's a business that is reinvesting profits at increasing rates of return. Having said that, from a first glance at Victoria (LON:VCP) we aren't jumping out of our chairs at how returns are trending, but let's have a deeper look.
Return On Capital Employed (ROCE): What is it?
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 Victoria is:
Return on Capital Employed = Earnings Before Interest and Tax (EBIT) ÷ (Total Assets - Current Liabilities)
0.042 = UK£46m ÷ (UK£1.4b - UK£262m) (Based on the trailing twelve months to April 2021).
Therefore, Victoria has an ROCE of 4.2%. Ultimately, that's a low return and it under-performs the Consumer Durables industry average of 6.2%.
View our latest analysis for Victoria
Above you can see how the current ROCE for Victoria compares to its prior returns on capital, but there's only so much you can tell from the past. If you'd like to see what analysts are forecasting going forward, you should check out our free report for Victoria.
What The Trend Of ROCE Can Tell Us
We weren't thrilled with the trend because Victoria's ROCE has reduced by 63% over the last five years, while the business employed 528% more capital. However, some of the increase in capital employed could be attributed to the recent capital raising that's been completed prior to their latest reporting period, so keep that in mind when looking at the ROCE decrease. Victoria probably hasn't received a full year of earnings yet from the new funds it raised, so these figures should be taken with a grain of salt. Additionally, we found that Victoria's most recent EBIT figure is around the same as the prior year, so we'd attribute the drop in ROCE mostly to the capital raise.
The Key Takeaway
In summary, Victoria is reinvesting funds back into the business for growth but unfortunately it looks like sales haven't increased much just yet. Yet to long term shareholders the stock has gifted them an incredible 342% return in the last five years, so the market appears to be rosy about its future. However, unless these underlying trends turn more positive, we wouldn't get our hopes up too high.
One more thing to note, we've identified 1 warning sign with Victoria and understanding it 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.
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.
Have feedback on this article? Concerned about the content? Get in touch with us directly. Alternatively, email editorial-team (at) simplywallst.com.
