Owner Scorecard


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ALIT, Alight Inc.

Commercial Services & Supplies diversified UnprofitableDistress / turnaround

A diversified business; where the profit really comes from, and whether it is earned or bought, is what the segment detail settles.

Latest annual: FY2025 10-K
ALIT · Alight Inc.
I

The business

What it sells, where the money comes from, the kind of company it is.

Revenue · FY2025
$2.3B
−3.0% YoY · −2% 5-yr CAGR
Vital signs · TTM
Cash & investments $178M

The business in brief

read the 10-K →

What this business is and what moves its needle, from its own SEC filings.

Situation
Unprofitable. No sustained operating profit across the record; an earnings multiple has nothing to rest on. What the record does show is revenue, the gross-margin trajectory, and the burn against the cash on hand. Distress / turnaround. Thin interest coverage, or operating cash burned against real debt, across the record. The balance sheet carries this situation; the debt schedule sets the clock.
What moves the needle
Operating margin has reached 10% at its best but run negative through the cycle (median −3.9%) — so the question is which reading is truer: whether the median was pulled below zero by one-off charges, by the cycle, or by spending it is still growing into, and whether it settles back at a profit. 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?
Return on capital has rarely cleared the cost of capital (median −1%, above 15% in 0 of 5 years). By owner earnings: roughly 9% of revenue reaches owners as cash, consistently. This is price-taker territory, where the balance sheet and the cycle matter more than any multiple; the rest is in the 10-K.

Every line is arithmetic on the company's filings, shown in full in the sections below.

II

The record

Ten years of arithmetic, read across the cycle.

The record, 2019–2025

realized figures from each filing · older years to the left
2019’192020’202022’222023’232024’242025’25TTMTTMMar 2026
Income statement
$2.6B$2.7B$2.2B$2.4B$2.3B$2.3B$2.2BRevenueRevenue
22%25%25%19%19%SG&A / revenueSG&A/rev
$265M$147M($94M)($81M)($90M)($3.1B)($3.1B)Operating incomeOp. inc.
10.4%5.4%−4.3%−3.4%−3.9%−136.6%−138.1%Operating marginOp. mgn
($62M)($345M)($157M)($3.1B)($3.1B)Net incomeNet inc.
Cash flow & returns
$286M$386M$252M$360M$366MOperating cash flowOp. cash
$68M$91M$301M$301M$299M$296M$294MDepreciationDeprec.
($117M)$291M$34M$3.1B$3.1BWorking capital & otherWC & other
$131M$140M$121M$110M$107MCapexCapex
5.9%5.9%5.2%4.9%4.8%Capex / revenueCapex/rev
$155M$246M$131M$250M$259MOwner earningsOwner earn.
7.0%10.3%5.6%11.1%11.5%Owner earnings marginOE mgn
$155M$246M$131M$250M$259MFree cash flowFCF
7.0%10.3%5.6%11.1%11.5%Free cash flow marginFCF mgn
$87M$0$0$0$0AcquisitionsAcquis.
$0$0$21M$86M$65MDividends paidDiv. paid
$12M$40M$167M$65MBuybacksBuybacks
3%-1%-1%-1%-88%-86%ROICROIC
-1%-8%-4%-297%-301%Return on equityROE
−1%−8%−4%−305%−307%Retained to equityRetained/eq
Balance sheet
$506M$228M$324M$343M$273M$178MCash & investmentsCash+inv
$532M$678M$435M$471M$387M$359MReceivablesReceiv.
$394M$508M$325M$355M$253M$215MAccounts payablePayables
$138M$170M$110M$116M$134M$144MOperating working capitalOper. WC
$2.2B$2.8B$2.8B$1.3B$1.1B$981MCurrent assetsCur. assets
$1.8B$2.3B$2.2B$892M$874M$693MCurrent liabilitiesCur. liab.
1.2×1.2×1.3×1.4×1.3×1.4×Current ratioCurr. ratio
$2.2B$3.7B$3.2B$3.2B$83M$83MGoodwillGoodwill
$7.0B$11.2B$10.8B$8.2B$4.6B$4.3BTotal assetsAssets
$4.1B$2.8B$2.8B$2.0B$2.0B$2.0BTotal debtDebt
$3.6B$2.6B$2.5B$1.7B$1.7B$1.8BNet debt / (cash)Net debt
1.2×0.6×-0.8×-0.6×-0.9×-33.6×-33.0×Interest coverageInt. cov.
$683M$4.4B$4.5B$4.3B$1.0B$1.0BShareholders’ equityEquity
0.4%0.2%7.4%5.8%3.3%0.8%0.8%Stock comp / revenueSBC/rev
Per share
459M489M540M528M525MShares out (diluted)Shares
$4.81$4.87$4.32$4.29$4.28Revenue / shareRev/sh
$-0.14$-0.70$-0.29$-5.87$-5.89EPS (diluted)EPS
$0.34$0.50$0.24$0.47$0.49Owner earnings / shareOE/sh
$0.34$0.50$0.24$0.47$0.49Free cash flow / shareFCF/sh
$0.00$0.00$0.04$0.16$0.12Dividends / shareDiv/sh
$0.29$0.29$0.22$0.21$0.20Cap. spending / shareCapex/sh
$9.68$9.12$7.97$1.98$1.96Book value / shareBVPS
Per-share growththe realized rate an owner's share compounded
6-yr5-yr
Revenue / share−3.8%/yr (3-yr)−3.8%/yr (3-yr)
Owner earnings / share+11.9%/yr (3-yr)+11.9%/yr (3-yr)
Capital spending / share−10.0%/yr (3-yr)−10.0%/yr (3-yr)
Book value / share−41.1%/yr (3-yr)−41.1%/yr (3-yr)

The record, charted

FY2019–2025

Each measure over its full record; the current point and the worst year marked.

Share count
528Mpeak FY2024
ROIC
−88%low FY2025
Net debt ÷ owner earnings
6.9×peak FY2022

Owner earnings vs. net income

Owner earningsNet income

The accountant's number, and the cash an owner can take; the gap is the tell.

$250Mowner earningsvs.($3.1B)net incomelow FY2024

Where the cash went

ReinvestBuybacksDividendsAcquisitionsRetained

Each year's operating cash, by what management did with it: the mix, and how it drifts.

FY2022FY2025

Net income is the accountant's number; owner earnings is the cash an owner could take out. The walk between them, off the cash-flow statement, and whether the gap is widening or holding.

In fiscal 2025 the business turned a $3.1B loss into $250M of owner earnings: more cash than the profit line showed, after the non-cash charges and the capital it put back in.

FY2025FY2024FY2023FY2022
Reported net income($3.1B)($157M)($345M)($62M)
Depreciation & amortizationnon-cash charge added back+$296M+$299M+$301M+$301M
Stock-based compensationreal costnon-cash, but a real cost+$19M+$76M+$139M+$164M
Working capital & othertiming of cash in and out, other non-cash items+$3.1B+$34M+$291M−$117M
Cash from operations$360M$252M$386M$286M
Capital expenditurecash put back in to keep running and to grow−$110M−$121M−$140M−$131M
Owner earnings$250M$131M$246M$155M
Owner-earnings marginowner earnings ÷ revenue11%6%10%7%

Owner earnings is the cash an owner could pull out without starving the business: operating cash less the capital it must spend to hold its position . The cash-flow statement also adds stock comp back as non-cash, but it is a real cost paid in shares; counted as the expense it is (less $19M), owner earnings is nearer $231M.

Maintenance capex is estimated as depreciation where a growing business invests above it; free cash flow is the figure the scorecard's free-cash margin reads.

III

Quality & stewardship

Returns, the balance sheet, capital allocation, and pay.

Owner’s Scorecard

FY2025 10-K · source on SEC EDGAR →

Will it survive?

  • Does not cover its interest
    Operating income ($3.1B) ÷ interest expense $92M
    What this means

    A full year of operating profit didn't cover the interest bill. This is the zombie zone: the business depends on refinancing, asset sales, or forbearance to service its debt.

  • Net debt against an operating loss
    Cash $273M − debt $2.0B
    What this means

    Netting $273M of cash and short-term investments against $2.0B of debt leaves $1.7B owed, with no operating profit this year to measure it against — understand that combination before anything else about the company. Net debt is the leverage figure that matters: the cash is already set against the debt. Strategic or illiquid investments aren't counted here.

  • Not enough data
    What this means

    The filing data didn't include the inputs for this check.

Is it a good business?

  • Below average through the cycle
    5-yr median, range -88%–3%; -88% latest = NOPAT ($2.4B) ÷ invested capital $2.8B
    Industry peers: median 5%
    What this means

    The rate the business earns on the money tied up in it, Buffett's north star, because over time a stock tracks the ROIC beneath it. Above ~15% sustained hints at a moat; a return below the cost of capital (~8%) erodes value as a business grows rather than building it — the test Buffett weighs most. The headline is the median of the last 5 years (it ran -88% most recently), so one peak or trough year doesn't set the verdict. Asset-light businesses (R&D expensed, little capital) read artificially high, pair this with Owner Earnings.

  • Solid through the cycle
    4-yr median margin, range 6%–11%; latest $250M = operating cash $360M − maintenance capex $110M
    Industry peers: median 9%
    What this means

    What an owner could take out without starving the business: operating cash less the maintenance capital it must spend to hold its position — Buffett's owner earnings. That's 11% of revenue this year, a 7% median across 4 years. Treating stock comp as the real expense it is (less $19M of SBC) leaves $231M.

  • Loss, but cash-generative
    Net income ($3.1B) · cash from operations $360M
    What this means

    The company reported a net loss, so a conversion ratio isn't meaningful. What matters then is whether operations still threw off cash, here, they did.

How is the cash used?

  • Returns about half
    Dividends + buybacks $151M ÷ Owner Earnings $250M
    What this means

    Of $250M Owner Earnings, $151M (60%) went back to shareholders, $86M dividends, $65M buybacks. Net of $19M stock comp, the real buyback was about $46M. Returning most of it is the mark of a mature business with little left to reinvest at a high return; reinvesting most could mean a long runway, or empire-building. The split doesn't say which; the return earned on it (see ROIC) does.

  • Investing or harvesting? 0.37×
    Harvesting
    Capex $110M ÷ depreciation $296M
    What this means

    Descriptive, not a grade. Above ~1× means investing faster than assets wear out (growth, or, sustained for years, today's earnings carrying less depreciation than tomorrow's will). Below means spending less than it's wearing out (efficiency, or a melting asset base). The ratio won't tell you which; the filings will.

Graham’s defensive tests · 1 of 4 met

Graham’s numerical criteria for the defensive investor (The Intelligent Investor, ch. 14), run on the filings. A floor of safety, not a buy signal; many fine modern businesses fail his strictest liquidity rules by design.

  • Adequate size Pass
    Revenue ≥ $2B · $2.3B
    What this means

    Big enough to weather a storm. Graham's 1972 floor was ~$100M of sales (≈ $700M today); we use a $2B revenue line as a conservative modern stand-in.

  • Strong liquidity Miss
    Current ratio ≥ 2× · 1.31×
    What this means

    Current assets at least twice current liabilities, near-term bills covered without touching the business. Strict by design: many cash-rich modern firms run leaner and miss it, holding their cushion in longer-dated securities.

  • Conservative debt Miss
    Debt ≤ working capital · $2.0B vs $268M WC
    What this means

    Graham's rule that borrowings not exceed net current assets. Capital-heavy and buyback-heavy firms routinely fail it, read it next to interest coverage, not alone.

  • Dividend record Miss
    Uninterrupted dividends · 2 of 6 yrs
    What this means

    An unbroken dividend was Graham's mark of durability. He wanted twenty years; the filings show about ten, and a single suspension breaks the streak. Non-payers, many fine modern compounders, fall outside his defensive net by design.

  • Moderate price
    P/E ≤ 15 and P/E × P/B ≤ 22.5 · decided by the price
    What this means

    Graham's valuation gate, the wall he kept between a sound business and a sound investment. Three-year average earnings are $-2.29/share (latest year $-5.90), the averaged base the calculator's gate runs on, and book value is $1.99/share. Enter a price in “What the price implies” just below for the P/E, P/B, and whether it clears. But this is the rule Buffett outgrew: there's no hard P/E law, and a wonderful business can deserve a far richer multiple if the thesis holds, treat it as the bargain-hunter's floor, not a verdict on the price.

Durability & moat, 2019–2025

Whether the record’s returns held, and what the capital reinvested earned.

  • Profitable years 0 of 4
    What this means

    Lost money in 4 year(s), look at what happened there before trusting the average.

  • Return on capital ≥ 15% 0 of 5 yrs
    What this means

    A moat shows up as a high return on invested capital that holds year after year, not one good vintage.

  • Operating margin 4% → −48% (3-yr avg ends)
    What this means

    Through the cycle the operating margin slipped — about 4% early to −48% lately, median −4% — competition or costs are biting in.

  • Reinvestment, incremental ROIC returns capital
    What this means

    The capital base barely grew: this business returns cash through dividends and buybacks rather than reinvesting. Judge it on the cash returned, not on compounding.

  • Owner earnings growth −2%/yr
    What this means

    Owner earnings shrank about 2% a year over the record.

  • Worst year 2025 · −136.6% op. margin
    What this means

    Operations went underwater in 2025, understand why before trusting the good years.

  • Share count +2.4%/yr
    What this means

    The share count is rising, dilution works against you on a per-share basis.

  • Dividend record rising
    What this means

    Paid and raised the dividend across the record, the continuity Graham prized.

  • How management talks about it Owner’s terms
    What this means

    Returns have thinned, but the filing discusses it in an owner’s vocabulary rather than selling past it — candor about a hard stretch counts for more than an adjective.

Does AI threaten the moat?

Elevated contestability

The product is software or information, the very thing capable AI now produces more cheaply, so the moat is more contestable than the record alone implies.

In its own filing Named as a competitive risk

Its FY2025 10-K names artificial intelligence as a competitive threat.

“Large and well-capitalized competitors may be able to respond to the need for technological changes (including the implementation of AI and ML) and innovate faster, or price their services more aggressively.”

The product is the kind capable AI most directly contests: when a substitute can be built cheaply, the incumbent's pricing power is the first thing at risk. The record cannot say whether the moat outlasts that; past durability is a starting point, not a promise.

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, 2026

Can 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$981M
  • Cash & short-term investments$178M
  • Receivables$359M
  • Other current assets$444M
Current liabilities$693M
  • Debt due within a year$20M
  • Accounts payable$215M
  • Other current liabilities$458M
Current ratio1.42×all current assets ÷ what's due · Graham looked for 2×
Quick ratio1.42×stricter: inventory excluded
Cash ratio0.26×strictest: cash alone against what's due
Working capital$288Mthe cushion left after near-term bills
Debt due this year vs. cash$20M due · $178M cash covered by cash on hand, no refinancing forced · both figures from the Mar 31, 2026 balance sheet
Revenue, latest quarter vs. a year ago−2.6%the freshest read on whether the business is still growing
Current ratio, recent quarters1.4× → 1.4×
Deeper floors
Tangible book value($1.6B)equity stripped of goodwill & intangibles
Net current asset value($2.3B)Graham's net-net: current assets less all liabilities
Debt incl. operating leases$2.1B$69M of it operating leases
Deferred revenue$143Mcustomer cash collected before delivery; operating float

From the company's latest filing.

How the cash was used, 2022–2025

Over the record, the business generated $1.3B of operating cash; how management split it reads as a deleverager, a meaningful share of cash went to paying down debt.

  • Reinvested$502M · 39%
  • Dividends$107M · 8%
  • Buybacks$284M · 22%
  • Retained (debt / cash)$391M · 30%
  • Returned to owners$391M

    50% of the owner earnings the business produced over the span, $107M as dividends and $284M as buybacks.

  • Source of fundingOperating cash

    Operating cash covered reinvestment and returns; over the span debt fell $823M and cash and short-term investments fell $50M.

  • Average price paid for buybacks

    Buybacks ran $284M over the span, but the filings don't tag the share count needed to deduce the average price paid.

  • Net change in share count14.4%

    The diluted count rose from 459M to 525M: issuance (stock pay, deals) outran any buybacks, so owners were diluted on net.

  • Dividend record$0.16/sh

    Paid in 2 of the years on record. It was never cut over the span.

Buybacks are gross of stock issued to staff; the share-count line above is the net of that, the figure that decides whether owners gained. The average price paid blends a year of purchases (and any accelerated repurchase), so it is close, not exact. The record of where the cash went and on what terms.

Acquisitions & goodwill

from the balance sheet & the 6-year cash-flow record

Goodwill 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$2.7B58% of all assets; the premium carried on the balance sheet for businesses acquired
Against book equity8%goodwill is this share of book equity; the rest is the company’s own retained and paid-in capital
Cash spent acquiring$88Mover 6 years buying other businesses, against $502M of capital spent building

$3.1B written down across 1 year (2025): goodwill the company has already conceded it overpaid for, charged against earnings. A write-down costs no cash (the cash went out when the deal was signed), but it is management marking its own past judgment to market.

Goodwill, acquired intangibles and equity from the latest balance sheet; acquisition spend and write-downs summed across the 6-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 yearChief executivePay, as filed“Actually paid”Owner earnings
2021Stephan D. Scholl$55.5M$47.9M
2022Stephan D. Scholl$7.3M$18.2M$155M
2023Stephan D. Scholl$8.0M$9.8M$246M
2024David D. Guilmette$7.3M$7.1M$131M
2024Stephan D. Scholl$12.9M$5.8M$131M
2025David D. Guilmette$10.6M−$4.6M$250M

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 ownership2.1%

    The stake all directors and executive officers hold together, per the 2026 proxy: skin in the game, the first thing Munger reads.

  • CEO pay ratio168:1

    What the chief earns for every dollar the median employee makes, per the 2026 proxy. A high ratio alone settles nothing; some businesses are genuinely top-heavy in scarce skill. A runaway figure is where Buffett starts asking whether the board is doing its job.

  • Stock-based compensation$19M

    The slice of the business handed to employees in shares this year, 1% of revenue. 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.

Inverting the record

Invert: instead of why Alight Inc. is a good business, the question is what would make owning it a mistake, and whether those marks are in the record. Disconfirming tests across 2019–2025.

1 of the 3 tests turned up something to look into; the other 2 came back clean.

  • Look hereDid the share count rise anyway?14.4%

    Diluted shares grew 14.4% over 2022–2025, even as the company spent $284M on buybacks. The repurchases were outrun by issuance — to staff, in a raise, or in a deal — and the filing says which; owners' slice still shrank. Read the buyback line beside this one, not on its own.

And these came back clean
  • Is it less profitable than it was?
  • Are "one-time" charges a yearly habit?

Each test is read from the filings and is noisy alone; a flag can mark a cyclical trough or a year of heavy investment as easily as a problem. The filing says which.

What an owner would ask, FY2025

read the 10-K →
  • Which reported numbers are a judgment call?
    Management names Revenue recognition, Acquisitions 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, Commercial Services & Supplies

The same industry, side by side on owner economics. 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.

CompanyRevenueGross marginOp. marginROICOwner earn. margin
WUWestern Union$3.9B39%19.6%42%15%
ADVAdvantage Solutions Inc.$3.5B-1.2%-8%3%
CBZCBIZ$2.8B14%8.5%5%9%
ALITAlight Inc.$2.3B-3.6%-1%9%
WEXWEX Inc.$1.8B45%29.9%7%25%
RELYRemitly Global Inc.$1.6B-11.4%-27%5%
TICTIC Solutions Inc.$1.5B29%-1.1%-0%4%
WNSWNS Holdings$1.3B35%12.8%15%11%
Group median3.7%3%9%
IV

The price

What a price has to assume.

What the price implies

reverse-DCF

Type today's close and see the owner-earnings growth you'd have to believe to justify it, beside what Alight Inc. has delivered.

Alight Inc.’s latest year runs above its own through-cycle margin — the reported figure may flatter a peak. So the tool opens on the through-cycle base, Graham’s averaging cutting both ways; clear the toggle below to read the latest year exactly as reported.

$

Through the cycle, Alight Inc. earns about $196M on its 8.7% median owner-earnings margin. This year’s 11.1% margin runs above that; the reported figure may flatter a peak you'd be paying on. Normalize, below, values the price on that through-cycle figure rather than the latest year. It comes pre-checked here for that reason, the same rule that already normalizes a trough; clear it to price the year as filed.

Base

The assumptions

9.0% = the 4.55% 10-year Treasury (Jul 15, 2026) + 4.45 points of equity premium. The rate you require is yours to set.

Enter a price above to run it.

Implied by the price
Owner-earnings growth · ’22→’25−2%/yr
Owner-earnings yield
P/E (3-yr earnings ’23–’25)
P/B
Graham’s price gate

Graham capped the multiple at 15×; Buffett and Munger let that rule go: a wonderful business can deserve 50× if the thesis holds. The gate marks the bargain-hunter's floor.

Against a high-grade bond: Graham’s yardstick bond yield%

Prefilled with the 10-year Treasury (4.55%, as of Jul 15, 2026). Edit it for today’s exact figure, or a AAA corporate yield.

Graham measured a stock against the bond you could own instead, the heart of his margin of safety. Enter a price above to weigh the owner-earnings yield against this bond.

Owner earnings $259M on 525M shares outstanding (a weighted basic average, the only count this filer tags); net debt $1.8B. The base opens on the through-cycle figure (the latest year sits above the record’s own median, and Graham’s averaging cuts both ways); clear Normalize to use the year as filed. Net of stock comp treats option pay as the expense it is. The dials set the multiple a growth belief justifies; the price, and every dollar on this page, is yours.

Cite: Owner Scorecard, "Alight Inc. (ALIT), the owner's record," https://ownerscorecard.com/c/ALIT, data as of 2026-07-09.

Manual order: ← ALHC its page in the Manual ALK →

Industry order: ← AKAM the Commercial Services & Supplies chapter ALLE →