Capital expenditure
Money invested in fixed assets: construction, equipment, modernisation.
How to read the number
Capex is the price of future growth. A company without it does not grow; a company with too much of it does not pay.
When the metric lies
Capex splits into maintenance and growth, but statements almost never disclose the split — every estimate of maintenance capex is an analyst's assumption.
Where it is used
The metric is calculated across every security in the catalogue and appears on the instrument card, in the multiples table and in the screener.
Also known as: capex, capital expenditure