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. Amongst other things, we'll want to see two things; firstly, a growing return on capital employed (ROCE) and secondly, an expansion in the company's amount 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 Lifeway Foods (NASDAQ:LWAY) we really liked what we saw.

What Is Return On Capital Employed (ROCE)?

If you haven't worked with ROCE before, it measures the 'return' (pre-tax profit) a company generates from capital employed in its business. The formula for this calculation on Lifeway Foods is:

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

0.21 = US$13m ÷ (US$80m - US$16m) (Based on the trailing twelve months to September 2023).

So, Lifeway Foods has an ROCE of 21%. In absolute terms that's a great return and it's even better than the Food industry average of 10%.

Check out our latest analysis for Lifeway Foods

Above you can see how the current ROCE for Lifeway Foods 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 analyst report for Lifeway Foods .

So How Is Lifeway Foods' ROCE Trending?

We're delighted to see that Lifeway Foods is reaping rewards from its investments and is now generating some pre-tax profits. Shareholders would no doubt be pleased with this because the business was loss-making five years ago but is is now generating 21% on its capital. Not only that, but the company is utilizing 21% more capital than before, but that's to be expected from a company trying to break into profitability. This can tell us that the company has plenty of reinvestment opportunities that are able to generate higher returns.

The Key Takeaway

Long story short, we're delighted to see that Lifeway Foods' reinvestment activities have paid off and the company is now profitable. And with the stock having performed exceptionally well over the last five years, these patterns are being accounted for by investors. With that being said, we still think the promising fundamentals mean the company deserves some further due diligence.

On a separate note, we've found 1 warning sign for Lifeway Foods you'll probably want to know about.