Finding a business that has the potential to grow substantially is not easy, but it is possible if we look at a few key financial metrics. 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 Seatrium's (SGX:5E2) returns on capital, so let's have a look.

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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 Seatrium:

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

0.016 = S$163m ÷ (S$17b - S$7.6b) (Based on the trailing twelve months to December 2024).

Therefore, Seatrium has an ROCE of 1.6%. In absolute terms, that's a low return and it also under-performs the Machinery industry average of 4.4%.

See our latest analysis for Seatrium

SGX:5E2 Return on Capital Employed July 16th 2025

In the above chart we have measured Seatrium's prior ROCE against its prior performance, but the future is arguably more important. If you're interested, you can view the analysts predictions in our free analyst report for Seatrium .

So How Is Seatrium's ROCE Trending?

We're delighted to see that Seatrium is reaping rewards from its investments and is now generating some pre-tax profits. About five years ago the company was generating losses but things have turned around because it's now earning 1.6% on its capital. In addition to that, Seatrium is employing 77% more capital than previously which is expected of a company that's trying to break into profitability. We like this trend, because it tells us the company has profitable reinvestment opportunities available to it, and if it continues going forward that can lead to a multi-bagger performance.

On a side note, Seatrium's current liabilities are still rather high at 43% of total assets. This can bring about some risks because the company is basically operating with a rather large reliance on its suppliers or other sorts of short-term creditors. While it's not necessarily a bad thing, it can be beneficial if this ratio is lower.

What We Can Learn From Seatrium's ROCE

To the delight of most shareholders, Seatrium has now broken into profitability. And since the stock has fallen 70% over the last five years, there might be an opportunity here. With that in mind, we believe the promising trends warrant this stock for further investigation.

While Seatrium looks impressive, no company is worth an infinite price. The intrinsic value infographic for 5E2 helps visualize whether it is currently trading for a fair price.

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.