Profitability
Return on Capital Employed (ROCE)
ROCE is the return earned on the capital employed in the business, a close relative of ROIC.
ROCE takes operating profit and divides by capital employed, often total assets minus current liabilities. The idea is the same as ROIC: how hard does the capital work? Stocklytics shows ROCE on the financial table because it can be built from the statements without a bespoke invested-capital definition.
Compare ROCE with the company's cost of capital and with its own past. A rising ROCE with steady revenue often means the business is getting more efficient. A falling ROCE with aggressive expansion often means the new capital is earning less than the old capital. That is the moment growth stops being automatically good.
Formula
ROCE = operating profit ÷ (total assets − current liabilities)
Live example
Apple Inc. (AAPL) last printed at $345.33 with a market cap of $5.04T. Apply the formula on this page to that live price. Where the quote is missing an input, the stock page's financials are the next place to read it.
Related
Return on Invested Capital (ROIC) · Return on Equity (ROE) · Operating Margin
See it on a list: best stocks · screener
Questions
ROCE or ROIC?
They aim at the same question and differ in the details of profit and capital. Use whichever your source defines clearly, and do not mix them in one comparison.
Why is ROCE on the stock page?
It is one of the return ratios in the financial summary, next to margins and cash-flow yields, so the quality of the business is visible beside the valuation.