Compounding is a powerful force—but what tells us whether a company might be a high quality compounder? We focus on return on operating capital employed (ROOCE) and gross margins. Companies with high ROOCE typically have high-margin and asset-light operations, while high gross margins generally reflect pricing power. These attributes indicate to us which companies are worth looking at more closely, and where we ought to be spending our time evaluating franchise durability.
