Share count
97Mpeak FY2024
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ACTG, Acacia Research Corporation
Acacia Research Corporation is a disciplined value-oriented acquirer and operator of businesses across public and private markets and industries including but not limited to the industrial, energy and technology sectors.
Through our public market activities, we aim to initiate strategic block positions in public companies as a path to complete whole company acquisitions or strategic transactions that unlock value.
The business
What it sells, where the money comes from, the kind of company it is.
Revenue · FY2025
$285M
+133.2% YoY · 57% 5-yr CAGR
Vital signs · TTM, with 5-yr average
Revenue $215M 5-yr avg $136M
Revenue $54M −56.4% vs yr-ago qtr
Operating margin −15.4% yr-ago 30.8%
Net income ($18M) yr-ago $24M
Net margin −32.5% yr-ago 18.9%
The business in brief
read the 10-K →What this business is and what moves its needle, from its own SEC filings.
- What it is
- Revenue is led by Manufacturing Operations (40%) and Intellectual property operations (27%), with 2 more segments behind.
- What moves the needle
- Occupancy, rents, and the cost of debt. Read on funds from operations and net asset value, because GAAP depreciation distorts the earnings, and a property downturn meets a balance sheet built on leverage. On its own account, the filing leans hardest on pricing power & competition, set against the numbers in what the filing emphasizes, below.
- Is it a good business?
- Funds from operations per share have shrunk (−3% a year). The dividend takes 0% of FFO, and is covered. Debt is 12% of assets, conservative for a REIT. The quality and location of the properties, the lease terms and occupancy, and the cost of the debt are what the 10-K settles, and no single ratio captures them.
Every line is arithmetic on the company's filings, shown in full in the sections below.
Where the money comes from
read the 10-K →Revenue spreads across 4 segments, the largest Manufacturing Operations at 40%.
Revenue by reportable segment, FY2025
- Manufacturing Operations40%$115M
- Intellectual property operations27%$78M
- Energy operations22%$64M
- Industrial operations10%$28M
From the segment footnote of the company's own 10-K. Shares are of total revenue; the profit bar shows each segment's share of segment operating profit, before unallocated corporate costs.
The record
Ten years of arithmetic, read across the cycle.
The record, 2017–2025
realized figures from each filing · older years to the left| 2017’17 | 2018’18 | 2019’19 | 2020’20 | 2021’21 | 2022’22 | 2023’23 | 2024’24 | 2025’25 | TTMTTMMar 2026 | |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Income statement | ||||||||||
| $65M | $132M | $11M | $30M | $88M | $59M | $125M | $122M | $285M | $215M | RevenueRevenue |
| $22M | ($105M) | ($17M) | $109M | $149M | ($125M) | $67M | ($36M) | $22M | ($18M) | Net incomeNet inc. |
| Cash flow & returns | ||||||||||
| $44M | ($78M) | ($14M) | $114M | $160M | ($112M) | $82M | ($2M) | $65M | $23M | Funds from operationsFFO |
| Balance sheet | ||||||||||
| 0% | — | — | 1% | 1% | — | 2% | — | — | 0% | Dividend payout (FFO)Payout |
| $309M | $224M | $218M | $511M | $799M | $483M | $634M | $756M | $771M | $756M | Total assetsAssets |
| — | — | — | — | — | — | $0 | $45M | $92M | $91M | Total debtDebt |
| — | — | — | — | — | — | ($440M) | ($229M) | ($215M) | ($267M) | Net debt / (cash)Net debt |
| $294M | $189M | $173M | $277M | $419M | $258M | $568M | $515M | $543M | $529M | Shareholders’ equityEquity |
| Per share | ||||||||||
| 50.7M | 50.0M | 50.9M | 57.4M | 98.5M | 42.5M | 92.4M | 99.2M | 97.2M | 96.5M | Shares out (diluted)Shares |
| $0.88 | $-1.56 | $-0.27 | $1.99 | $1.62 | $-2.63 | $0.89 | $-0.03 | $0.67 | $0.24 | FFO / shareFFO/sh |
| $0.00 | — | $0.00 | $0.02 | $0.01 | $0.07 | $0.02 | $0.00 | — | $0.00 | Dividends / shareDiv/sh |
| $5.81 | $3.79 | $3.40 | $4.83 | $4.26 | $6.08 | $6.15 | $5.19 | $5.59 | $5.48 | Book value / shareBVPS |
The diluted share count moved ×1.71 into 2021 — shares issued, not a split the totals corroborate — and the per-share figures carry the counts as filed.
The diluted share count moved ×1/2.32 into 2022 — shares retired, not a split the totals corroborate — and the per-share figures carry the counts as filed.
The diluted share count moved ×2.18 into 2023 — shares issued, not a split the totals corroborate — and the per-share figures carry the counts as filed.
Per-share growththe realized rate an owner's share compounded
| 8-yr | 5-yr | |
|---|---|---|
| Revenue / share | +10.8%/yr | +41.4%/yr |
| Owner earnings / share | +11.9%/yr | — |
| EPS | −8.1%/yr | −34.9%/yr |
| Capital spending / share | +179.2%/yr | +111.3%/yr |
| Book value / share | −0.5%/yr | +3.0%/yr |
The year, in the company's words
the filing →Verbatim from the 10-K's management discussion. Each sentence is shown only because its subject, direction, and stated figures check out against the filed numbers on this page. The words are the company's; the arithmetic is the record's.
- Intellectual property operations+301.3%
“Intellectual Property Operations revenues increased due to an increase in average license fees, which contributed to Intellectual Property Operations revenues increasing by $58.8 million.”
✓ figure matches the filed record
The record, charted
FY2017–2025Each measure over its full record; the current point and the worst year marked.
Revenue
$285Mlow FY2019
Quality & stewardship
Returns, the balance sheet, capital allocation, and pay.
Owner’s Scorecard
FY2025 10-K · source on SEC EDGAR →
Material weakness in financial controls
“We identified a material weakness in our internal control over financial reporting at Benchmark.”
The figures below are only as sound as the controls that produced them. read the note →
Is it a good business?
- about $0.67 per shareNet income $22M + depreciation $43M
In the filing’s words The filing discloses a material weakness in its financial controls — the reported numbers here, and the record built on them, are only as reliable as the controls that produced them.
What this means
GAAP net income with property depreciation added back, because the buildings a REIT charges against earnings usually hold or grow their value. This, not net income, is what a REIT is actually priced on. It is an approximation here: where a filing reports gains on property sales, we remove them, the way the NAREIT definition does.
- Lightly coveredDividends $0 ÷ FFO $65MIndustry peers: median 70%
What this means
A REIT must distribute most of its taxable income, so a high payout is normal and the question is whether FFO covers it. Above 100%, the trust is funding the dividend with debt or asset sales, and a cut usually follows.
Is it sound?
- Debt / assets 12%ConservativeTotal debt $92M ÷ assets $771MIndustry peers: median 40%
What this means
Every REIT runs on leverage; how much is the question. Heavy debt is what turns a property downturn into a wipeout, as 2008 showed, so a conservative balance sheet is part of the moat here, not a drag on it.
- Not enough data
What this means
Operating income or interest is missing, or operating income sits far below net income (a triple-net REIT's lease income bypasses the operating line), so an EBITDA coverage would mislead — read it on net income against the interest bill, and on debt / assets, instead.
Does AI threaten the moat?
Low contestabilityThe moat is physical, regulated or balance-sheet-funded, the kind AI cuts costs within but does not contest.
AI is unlikely to contest a moat that is physical, regulated or balance-sheet-funded; here it reads more as a cost tool than a threat.
Read from the filing's own risk factors, paired with the industry's structure under its SIC code; the durability is read above, the price below.
All figures as filed; the source filing is linked above.
Current Position
as of the latest quarter, Mar 31, 2026Can the business pay what it owes this year, off the freshest balance sheet: the quality of the assets, the debt actually coming due, and what a low ratio means here.
Current assets$431M
- Cash & short-term investments$358M
- Receivables$29M
- Inventory$23M
- Other current assets$21M
Current liabilities$50M
- Accounts payable$11M
- Other current liabilities$39M
Current ratio8.56×all current assets ÷ what's due · Graham looked for 2×
Quick ratio8.09×stricter: inventory excluded
Cash ratio7.12×strictest: cash alone against what's due
Working capital$381Mthe cushion left after near-term bills
Revenue, latest quarter vs. a year ago−56.4%the freshest read on whether the business is still growing
Current ratio, recent quarters11.2× → 8.6×
Deeper floors
Tangible book value$457Mequity stripped of goodwill & intangibles
Net current asset value$242MGraham's net-net: current assets less all liabilities
Debt incl. operating leases$104M$13M of it operating leases
Deferred revenue$2Mcustomer cash collected before delivery; operating float
From the company's latest filing.
Acquisitions & goodwill
from the balance sheet & the 9-year cash-flow recordGoodwill grows only when a company acquires and falls only when it concedes it overpaid. The size of that bet, the cash put into buying rather than building, and how much has already been written off.
Goodwill & intangibles$74M10% of all assets; the premium carried on the balance sheet for businesses acquired
Against book equity5%goodwill is this share of book equity; the rest is the company’s own retained and paid-in capital
Cash spent acquiring$132Mover 9 years buying other businesses, against $164M of capital spent building
None written down over the record; the goodwill is still carried at full cost. That is the deals holding their value on the books so far; whether they keep doing so is the test an owner watches, since the write-down, when it comes, is the admission the price was too high.
Goodwill, acquired intangibles and equity from the latest balance sheet; acquisition spend and write-downs summed across the 9-year record, from the company's own filings.
Management, ownership & pay
read the proxy →From the proxy: how much of the business the people running it own, and how they are paid, beside what the business earned for its owners in the same years.
| Fiscal year | Chief executive | Pay, as filed | “Actually paid” | Owner earnings |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| 2023 | Mr. McNulty | $1.6M | $1.5M | ($23M) |
| 2024 | Mr. McNulty | $1.3M | $2.0M | $17M |
| 2025 | Mr. McNulty | $1.4M | $2.1M | $61M |
Both pay figures are the company’s own, from the pay-versus-performance table its proxy statement files. “As filed” is the Summary Compensation Table total: salary, bonus, and equity awards at their value on the day of grant. “Actually paid” is the SEC’s prescribed recalculation, which re-marks those equity awards to what they became as they vested; it can swing far above or below the filed figure in either direction, and negative years occur. Owner earnings are the whole business's, from the record above, for the same fiscal years.
- Insider ownership1.7%
The stake all directors and executive officers hold together, per the 2026 proxy: skin in the game, the first thing Munger reads.
- Stock-based compensation$6M
The slice of the business handed to employees in shares this year, 2% of revenue, equal to 90% of operating profit. Buffett's oldest accounting fight: this is compensation, compensation is an expense, real whether or not the headline earnings admit it. One trap: the cash-flow statement adds SBC back, so the operating cash, and the owner earnings drawn from it, are flattered by exactly this amount; counted as the cost it is, what an owner keeps is lower.
What an owner would ask, FY2025
read the 10-K →- Which reported numbers are a judgment call?Management names Revenue recognition, Income taxes as critical estimates
each rests partly on management's judgment; the filing's note sets out the assumptionsverify →
The questions the record and the charts do not answer on their own; each carries the figure and the place to look.
Peers, Capital Markets & Asset Management
The same industry, side by side on the REIT lens. Each figure is a through-cycle median, so a peak or trough year can’t distort it; the group median at the foot is the line to read each against.
| Company | Revenue | FFO margin | FFO / assets | Payout (FFO) | Debt / assets |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| APPSDigital Turbine Inc. | $565M | 2% | 1.4% | — | 40% |
| LXPLXP Industrial Trust | $350M | 55% | 5.3% | 81% | 24% |
| IVTInvenTrust Properties Corp. | $299M | 42% | 4.0% | 56% | 24% |
| CLDTChatham Lodging Trust | $295M | 21% | 5.0% | 29% | 40% |
| ACTGAcacia Research Corporation | $285M | -2% | 8.4% | 1% | 12% |
| SMASmartStop Self Storage REIT Inc. | $281M | 19% | 2.1% | 96% | 54% |
| CSRCenterspace | $274M | 33% | 4.3% | 58% | 45% |
| LTCLTC Properties | $263M | 57% | 6.4% | 88% | 45% |
| Group median | — | 27% | 4.7% | 58% | 40% |
The price
What a price has to assume.
What the price implies
price / FFOA REIT is priced on a multiple of its funds from operations (FFO), the cash it earns once the depreciation on its buildings is added back. Type today’s price; we show the multiple you would pay and the income and growth it implies.
$
The assumptions
FFO / share, delivered−32%/yr’20→’25
The justified multiple is 1 ÷ (required return − growth), a perpetuity on FFO. At an 8% required return and 3% growth, a REIT is worth about 20× FFO.
Enter a price above to run it.
Price / FFO—
Justified by growth—
Dividend yield—
A dated snapshot of the price you typed, the assumptions you set, and what the page showed for them. A snapshot is never edited after it is saved. Your notebook is yours alone — the commitment states what is stored and what we will never do.
FFO about $0.24 per share on 97M shares. The dials set the multiple they justify; your price sets the multiple you are paying. FFO here adds back depreciation and removes property-sale gains, the NAREIT method; it does not net out maintenance capex (AFFO), occupancy or lease terms, which the 10-K does.
Cite: Owner Scorecard, "Acacia Research Corporation (ACTG), the owner's record," https://ownerscorecard.com/c/ACTG, data as of 2026-07-09.
Manual order: ← ACT its page in the Manual ACVA →
Industry order: ← ABXL the Capital Markets & Asset Management chapter ALTI →