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AVGO, Broadcom Inc.

Semiconductors asset-light Serial acquirer

Broadcom designs semiconductors and the infrastructure software that runs alongside them, selling both into the systems that carry communications, run data centers, and power large-organization computing. One half is the chips — a broad range of connectivity and processing parts; the other half is software that large enterprises license to operate and secure what they run. It does not own the factories that etch its chips — it designs, others fabricate — and a handful of very large customers account for a large slice of what it sells.

Over the years, we have assembled a large team of semiconductor and software design engineers around the world.

We maintain design, product and software development engineering expertise and resources at locations primarily in the U.S., Asia, and Europe.

Latest annual: FY2025 10-K

AVGO · Broadcom Inc.

The business

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

Revenue · FY2025

$63.9B

+23.9% YoY · 22% 5-yr CAGR

Vital signs · TTM, with 5-yr average

Revenue $75.5B 5-yr avg $42.4B

Gross margin 68% 5-yr avg 66%

Operating margin 43.4% 5-yr avg 37.0%

ROIC 23% 5-yr avg 20%

Owner-earnings margin 44% 5-yr avg 45%

Free cash flow margin 43% 5-yr avg 45%

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 Semiconductor Solutions (58%) and Infrastructure Software (42%).
Situation: Serial acquirer. Goodwill and acquired intangibles are 76% of assets, with meaningful acquisition spending in 5 of the record's 10 years; much of what this business is was bought, at prices the record carries.
What moves the needle: The question is whether Broadcom is a franchise or a parts supplier: do the chip designs and the software wrapped around them lock customers in — hard to rip out and re-qualify once embedded — or is it silicon a rival could second-source on price. Weigh that against a business leaning on a few enormous customers and carrying net debt, assembled in good part by buying the firms it folds in. The bad case is a roll-up whose pricing rests on switching costs thinner than they look, while the designers who make the parts worth buying are bid away in a competitive labor market; the record below shows how the margins, the returns, and the debt actually sit.
Is it a good business?: Return on capital has sat near the cost of capital (median 13%). The steadier read is owner earnings: roughly 42% 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.

Drafted from the company's filings and reviewed by hand; every number is shown in full in the sections below.

Where the money comes from

read the 10-K →

The biggest segment, Semiconductor Solutions, is also where the profit is made: 58% of revenue and 51% of segment operating profit.

Revenue by reportable segment, FY2025

Operating profit same segments

Semiconductor Solutions58%$36.9B51% of profit
Infrastructure Software42%$27.0B49% of profit

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, 2016–2025

realized figures from each filing · older years to the left

2016’16	2017’17	2018’18	2019’19	2020’20	2021’21	2022’22	2023’23	2024’24	2025’25	TTMTTMMay 2026
											Income statement
$13.2B	$17.6B	$20.8B	$22.6B	$23.9B	$27.4B	$33.2B	$35.8B	$51.6B	$63.9B	$75.5B	RevenueRevenue
45%	48%	51%	55%	57%	61%	67%	69%	63%	68%	68%	Gross marginGross mgn
6%	4%	5%	8%	8%	5%	4%	4%	10%	7%	6%	SG&A / revenueSG&A/rev
20%	19%	18%	21%	21%	18%	15%	15%	18%	17%	16%	R&D / revenueR&D/rev
($409M)	$2.4B	$5.1B	$3.4B	$4.0B	$8.5B	$14.2B	$16.2B	$13.5B	$25.5B	$32.7B	Operating incomeOp. inc.
−3.1%	13.4%	24.6%	15.2%	16.8%	31.0%	42.8%	45.2%	26.1%	39.9%	43.4%	Operating marginOp. mgn
($1.7B)	$1.7B	$12.3B	$2.7B	$2.7B	$6.4B	$11.5B	$14.1B	$5.9B	$23.1B	$29.3B	Net incomeNet inc.
—	2%	—	—	—	0%	8%	7%	39%	-2%	4%	Effective tax rateTax rate
											Cash flow & returns
$3.4B	$6.6B	$8.9B	$9.7B	$12.1B	$13.8B	$16.7B	$18.1B	$20.0B	$27.5B	$33.6B	Operating cash flowOp. cash
$402M	$451M	$515M	$569M	$570M	$539M	$529M	$502M	$593M	$574M	$603M	DepreciationDeprec.
$4.1B	$3.5B	($5.1B)	$4.2B	$6.9B	$5.1B	$3.2B	$1.3B	$7.7B	($3.7B)	($5.1B)	Working capital & otherWC & other
$723M	$1.1B	$635M	$432M	$463M	$443M	$424M	$452M	$548M	$623M	$860M	CapexCapex
5.5%	6.1%	3.0%	1.9%	1.9%	1.6%	1.3%	1.3%	1.1%	1.0%	1.1%	Capex / revenueCapex/rev
$3.0B	$6.1B	$8.2B	$9.3B	$11.6B	$13.3B	$16.3B	$17.6B	$19.4B	$26.9B	$33.0B	Owner earningsOwner earn.
22.7%	34.6%	39.5%	41.0%	48.6%	48.5%	49.1%	49.2%	37.6%	42.1%	43.8%	Owner earnings marginOE mgn
$2.7B	$5.5B	$8.2B	$9.3B	$11.6B	$13.3B	$16.3B	$17.6B	$19.4B	$26.9B	$32.8B	Free cash flowFCF
20.3%	31.1%	39.5%	41.0%	48.6%	48.5%	49.1%	49.2%	37.6%	42.1%	43.4%	Free cash flow marginFCF mgn
$10.1B	$40M	$4.8B	$16.0B	$10.9B	$8M	$246M	$53M	$26.0B	$0	$0	AcquisitionsAcquis.
$716M	$1.7B	$2.9B	$4.2B	$5.2B	$5.9B	$6.7B	$7.6B	$9.8B	$11.1B	$11.8B	Dividends paidDiv. paid
$0	$0	$7.3B	$5.4B	$0	$0	$7.0B	$5.8B	$7.2B	$2.5B	—	BuybacksBuybacks
—	9%	13%	7%	7%	16%	27%	32%	6%	19%	23%	ROICROIC
-8%	8%	46%	11%	11%	26%	51%	59%	9%	28%	33%	Return on equityROE
−11%	0%	35%	−6%	−11%	2%	21%	27%	−6%	15%	20%	Retained to equityRetained/eq
											Balance sheet
$3.1B	$11.2B	$4.3B	$5.1B	$7.6B	$12.2B	$12.4B	$14.2B	$9.3B	$16.2B	$19.6B	Cash & investmentsCash+inv
—	$2.4B	$3.3B	$3.3B	$2.3B	$2.1B	$3.0B	$3.2B	$4.4B	$7.1B	$10.8B	ReceivablesReceiv.
—	$1.4B	$1.1B	$874M	$1.0B	$1.3B	$1.9B	$1.9B	$1.8B	$2.3B	$4.3B	InventoryInvent.
—	$1.1B	$811M	$855M	$836M	$1.1B	$998M	$1.2B	$1.7B	$1.6B	$2.3B	Accounts payablePayables
—	$2.8B	$3.6B	$3.3B	$2.5B	$2.3B	$3.9B	$3.8B	$4.5B	$7.9B	$12.8B	Operating working capitalOper. WC
—	$15.8B	$9.1B	$9.9B	$11.9B	$16.6B	$18.5B	$20.8B	$19.6B	$31.6B	$42.2B	Current assetsCur. assets
—	$2.5B	$2.3B	$6.9B	$6.4B	$6.3B	$7.1B	$7.4B	$16.7B	$18.5B	$18.9B	Current liabilitiesCur. liab.
—	6.3×	3.9×	1.4×	1.9×	2.6×	2.6×	2.8×	1.2×	1.7×	2.2×	Current ratioCurr. ratio
$24.7B	$24.7B	$26.9B	$36.7B	$43.4B	$43.5B	$43.6B	$43.7B	$97.9B	$97.8B	$97.8B	GoodwillGoodwill
—	$54.4B	$50.1B	$67.5B	$75.9B	$75.6B	$73.2B	$72.9B	$165.6B	$171.1B	$179.2B	Total assetsAssets
—	$17.5B	$17.6B	$33.1B	$41.5B	$39.7B	$39.1B	$37.6B	$69.8B	$67.1B	$66.7B	Total debtDebt
—	$6.3B	$13.3B	$28.0B	$33.9B	$27.5B	$26.7B	$23.4B	$60.5B	$50.9B	$47.1B	Net debt / (cash)Net debt
-0.7×	5.2×	8.2×	2.4×	2.3×	4.5×	8.2×	10.0×	3.4×	7.9×	10.4×	Interest coverageInt. cov.
$21.9B	$20.3B	$26.7B	$24.9B	$23.9B	$25.0B	$22.7B	$24.0B	$67.7B	$81.3B	$87.7B	Shareholders’ equityEquity
5.1%	5.2%	5.9%	9.7%	8.3%	6.2%	4.6%	6.1%	11.1%	11.8%	11.6%	Stock comp / revenueSBC/rev
											Per share
3.83B	4.21B	4.31B	4.19B	4.21B	4.29B	4.23B	4.27B	4.78B	4.85B	4.88B	Shares out (diluted)Shares
$3.46	$4.19	$4.84	$5.39	$5.67	$6.40	$7.85	$8.38	$10.79	$13.16	$15.46	Revenue / shareRev/sh
$-0.45	$0.40	$2.84	$0.64	$0.63	$1.50	$2.72	$3.30	$1.23	$4.77	$6.01	EPS (diluted)EPS
$0.79	$1.45	$1.91	$2.21	$2.75	$3.11	$3.85	$4.13	$4.06	$5.55	$6.76	Owner earnings / shareOE/sh
$0.70	$1.30	$1.91	$2.21	$2.75	$3.11	$3.85	$4.13	$4.06	$5.55	$6.71	Free cash flow / shareFCF/sh
$0.19	$0.39	$0.68	$1.01	$1.24	$1.38	$1.59	$1.79	$2.05	$2.30	$2.41	Dividends / shareDiv/sh
$0.19	$0.25	$0.15	$0.10	$0.11	$0.10	$0.10	$0.11	$0.11	$0.13	$0.18	Cap. spending / shareCapex/sh
$5.71	$4.82	$6.18	$5.95	$5.67	$5.82	$5.37	$5.62	$14.16	$16.75	$17.96	Book value / shareBVPS

Share counts before 2022 are restated ×10 for a stock split, so per-share figures sit on one basis.

Per-share growththe realized rate an owner's share compounded

	9-yr	5-yr
Revenue / share	+16.0%/yr	+18.3%/yr
Owner earnings / share	+24.3%/yr	+15.0%/yr
EPS	—	+49.8%/yr
Dividends / share	+32.1%/yr	+13.0%/yr
Capital spending / share	−4.2%/yr	+3.1%/yr
Book value / share	+12.7%/yr	+24.2%/yr

The record, charted

FY2016–2025

Each measure over its full record; the current point and the worst year marked. Share counts on the current split basis.

Share count

4.9Bpeak FY2025

ROIC

19%low FY2024

Gross margin

68%low FY2016

Net debt ÷ owner earnings

1.9×peak FY2024

Owner earnings vs. net income

Owner earningsNet income

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

$26.9Bowner earningsvs.$23.1Bnet incomelow FY2016

Where the cash went

ReinvestBuybacksDividendsAcquisitionsRetainedBeyond op. cash

Each year's outlays against its operating cash: the mix, and how it drifts. The hatched cap is spending beyond that year's operating cash — financed from the balance sheet or borrowing, not operations.

FY2016FY2025

Owner-earnings bridge

FY2021–FY2025cash-flow statement, SEC EDGAR →

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 $23.1B of profit into $26.9B of owner earnings: more cash than the profit line showed, after the non-cash charges and the capital it put back in.

Reported net income$23.1B

Owner earnings$26.9B · 42% of revenue

	FY2025	FY2024	FY2023	FY2022	FY2021
Reported net income	$23.1B	$5.9B	$14.1B	$11.5B	$6.4B
Depreciation & amortizationnon-cash charge added back	+$574M	+$593M	+$502M	+$529M	+$539M
Stock-based compensationreal costnon-cash, but a real cost	+$7.6B	+$5.7B	+$2.2B	+$1.5B	+$1.7B
Working capital & othertiming of cash in and out, other non-cash items	−$3.7B	+$7.7B	+$1.3B	+$3.2B	+$5.1B
Cash from operations	$27.5B	$20.0B	$18.1B	$16.7B	$13.8B
Capital expenditurecash put back in to keep running and to grow	−$623M	−$548M	−$452M	−$424M	−$443M
Owner earnings	$26.9B	$19.4B	$17.6B	$16.3B	$13.3B
Owner-earnings marginowner earnings ÷ revenue	42%	38%	49%	49%	49%

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 $7.6B), owner earnings is nearer $19.3B.

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?

Can it pay its interest? 7.9×

Comfortable

Operating income $25.5B ÷ interest expense $3.2B

What this means
Operating profit covers interest with the kind of margin Graham wanted for a defensive holding. Necessary, not sufficient, it says solvent, not cheap.
How heavy is the debt, net of cash? $50.9B · 2.0× operating profit

Modest net debt

Cash $16.2B − debt $67.1B

What this means
Netting $16.2B of cash and short-term investments against $67.1B of debt leaves $50.9B owed, about 2.0× a year's operating profit (2.6× on the gross debt, before the cash). Net debt is the leverage figure that matters: the cash is already set against the debt. Strategic or illiquid investments aren't counted here.
How long is cash tied up? 53d

Tight

DSO 41 + DIO 40 − DPO 28 days

What this means
Days cash is tied up between paying suppliers and collecting from customers. Lower is better; a long cycle means growth itself eats cash.

Is it a good business?

Return on invested capital 13%

Solid through the cycle

9-yr median, range 6%–32%; 19% latest = NOPAT $25.5B ÷ invested capital $132.2B

Industry peers: median 18%

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 9 years (it ran 19% 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.
Owner-earnings margin 41%

High through the cycle

10-yr median margin, range 23%–49%; latest $26.9B = operating cash $27.5B − maintenance capex $623M

Industry peers: median 14%

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 42% of revenue this year, a 41% median across 10 years. Treating stock comp as the real expense it is (less $7.6B of SBC) leaves $19.3B.
Are earnings backed by cash? 1.19×

Cash-backed

Cash from ops $27.5B ÷ net income $23.1B

What this means
How much of reported profit showed up as operating cash. Above 1× is reassuring; well below suggests earnings lean on accruals. One year is noisy, growth and working-capital swings distort it, and this is operating cash, not free cash. Watch the multi-year trend.

How is the cash used?

Where do the earnings go? 51%

Returns about half

Dividends + buybacks $13.6B ÷ Owner Earnings $26.9B

What this means
Of $26.9B Owner Earnings, $13.6B (51%) went back to shareholders, $11.1B dividends, $2.5B buybacks. But the buybacks barely exceed stock issued to employees ($7.6B SBC), net of dilution, little was truly returned. 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? 1.09×

Maintaining

Capex $623M ÷ depreciation $574M

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 · 3 of 6 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 · $63.9B

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 Near

Current ratio ≥ 2× · 1.71×

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 · $67.1B vs $13.1B 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.
Earnings stability Near

A profit every year (10-yr record) · 1 loss year

What this means
Graham wanted earnings in each of the past ten years, the stability a defensive owner leans on.
Dividend record Pass

Uninterrupted dividends · paid every year (10)

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.
Earnings growth Pass

Earnings +33% over the record · +253%

What this means
At least a third more earnings than a decade ago, averaging three years at each end. Net income (not per-share), so stock splits don't distort it, buybacks and dilution show up in the share-count line instead.
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 $3.02/share (latest year $4.86), the averaged base the calculator's gate runs on, and book value is $17.09/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, 2016–2025

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

Profitable years 9 of 10

What this means
Lost money in 1 year(s), look at what happened there before trusting the average.
Return on capital ≥ 15% 4 of 9 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 12% → 37% (3-yr avg ends)

What this means
Through the cycle the operating margin widened — about 12% early to 37% lately, median 25% — pricing power intact or improving.
Reinvestment, incremental ROIC 22%

What this means
Every extra dollar the business reinvested came back at a high incremental return — the lens GBM read for a moat that reinvests rather than merely harvests. The record and the 10-K are where you check whether the rate holds.
Owner earnings growth +20%/yr

What this means
Owner earnings grew about 20% a year over the record.
Worst year 2016 · −3.1% op. margin

What this means
Operations went underwater in 2016, understand why before trusting the good years.
Dividend record rising

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

Does AI threaten the moat?

Low contestability

The moat is physical, regulated or balance-sheet-funded, the kind AI cuts costs within but does not contest.

In its own filing A competitive risk, new this year

Its FY2025 10-K names artificial intelligence as a competitive threat, in language that was not in the prior year's filing.

“To remain competitive, we seek to evolve our business strategy or adopt new business models from time to time, such as the sale or leasing of AI racks or systems based on our XPUs, that require significant financial resources, which could have a material adverse effect on our results of operations.…”

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, and the company is using it that way.

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, May 3, 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$42.2B

Cash & short-term investments$19.6B
Receivables$10.8B
Inventory$4.3B
Other current assets$7.4B

Current liabilities$18.9B

Debt due within a year$2.3B
Accounts payable$2.3B
Other current liabilities$14.3B

Current ratio2.24×all current assets ÷ what's due · Graham looked for 2×

Quick ratio2.01×stricter: inventory excluded

Cash ratio1.04×strictest: cash alone against what's due

Working capital$23.4Bthe cushion left after near-term bills

Debt due this year vs. cash$2.3B due · $19.6B cash covered by cash on hand, no refinancing forced · both figures from the May 3, 2026 balance sheet

Revenue, latest quarter vs. a year ago+47.9%the freshest read on whether the business is still growing

Current ratio, recent quarters1.0× → 2.2×

Deeper floors

Tangible book value($38.4B)equity stripped of goodwill & intangibles

Net current asset value($49.3B)Graham's net-net: current assets less all liabilities

Debt incl. operating leases$66.2B$1.3B of it operating leases

Deferred revenue$14.2Bcustomer cash collected before delivery; operating float

From the company's latest filing.

Debt maturity

the debt note, SEC EDGAR →

Not how much it owes, but when it falls due, and against what. The ladder the company files, beside cash on hand and a year's owner earnings.

'26$3.2B

'27$2.5B

'28$7.1B

'29$4.7B

'30$6.4B

later$43.3B

Bars scaled to the largest single year; “later” is everything due after 2030, shown apart since it dwarfs the years.

Due in the next 12 months$3.2Bthe first rung: what must be repaid or rolled over within the year

Within two years$5.7Bthe near wall, the part most exposed to today’s credit conditions

Biggest single year$7.1Bin 2028the lumpiest maturity, where a refinancing, if needed, is largest

Total scheduled principal$67.1Bevery year plus what lies beyond, as the footnote totals it

Against what the business has and earns

Cash & short-term investments, May 3, 2026$19.6B

One year of owner earnings (FY2025)$26.9B

Together, against $3.2B due next year14.8×

Cash on hand as of May 3, 2026 plus a year’s owner earnings comes to $46.5B against the $3.2B due in the twelve months after the Nov 2, 2025 schedule: 15 times it.

Maturity schedule extracted from the company’s Nov 2, 2025 annual report and reconciled to the total the table states.

How the cash was used, 2016–2025

Over the record, the business generated $136.7B of operating cash; how management split it reads as a cash returner, paying most of what it earns straight back to owners.

Reinvested$5.8B · 4%
Dividends$56.0B · 41%
Buybacks$35.1B · 26%
Retained (debt / cash)$39.7B · 29%

Returned to owners$91.2B
69% of the owner earnings the business produced over the span, $56.0B as dividends and $35.1B as buybacks.
Average price paid for buybacks$40.61
Across the years where the filing reports a share count, 805M shares were bought for $32.7B, about $40.61 each. Year to year the price paid ranged from $22.68 (2018) to $107.10 (2024); its heaviest year, 2018, paid $22.68 ($7.3B).
Net change in share count27.5%
The diluted count rose from 3830M to 4882M: issuance (stock pay, deals) outran any buybacks, so owners were diluted on net.
Dividend record$2.30/sh
Paid in 10 of the years on record, the per-share dividend growing about 32% a year. 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 10-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$130.1B76% of all assets; the premium carried on the balance sheet for businesses acquired

Against book equityexceeds itgoodwill alone is larger than the company’s entire book equity; stripped of the acquisition premium, there is no net book worth

Cash spent acquiring$68.1Bover 10 years buying other businesses, against $5.8B 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 10-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
2021	Hock E. Tan	$60.7M	$84.0M	$13.3B
2022	Hock E. Tan	$60.6M	$50.0M	$16.3B
2023	Hock E. Tan	$161.8M	$768.0M	$17.6B
2024	Hock E. Tan	$2.6M	—	$19.4B
2025	Hock E. Tan	$205.3M	—	$26.9B

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 ownership1.9%
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$7.6B
The slice of the business handed to employees in shares this year, 12% of revenue, equal to 30% 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.

Inverting the record

Invert: instead of why Broadcom 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 2016–2025.

2 of the 4 tests turned up something to look into; the other 2 came back clean.

Look hereDid the share count rise anyway?27.5%
Diluted shares grew 27.5% over 2016–2025, even as the company spent $35.1B on buybacks. The repurchases were a treadmill: stock issued to staff outran them, so owners' slice still shrank. Read the buyback line beside this one, not on its own.
Look hereAre "one-time" charges a yearly habit?6 of 10 years
Management took an impairment or write-down in 6 of the last 10 years, $130M in all. Taken across the majority of the record, the "one-time" label is wearing thin — ask whether these are past deals coming due rather than genuinely isolated events. Read it beside the goodwill the company still carries.

And these came back clean

Is it less profitable than it was?
Did reported profit become cash?

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 →

How much of the revenue rides on one buyer?
≈$30.2B · 40% of revenue on the largest customers (TTM)
“We believe aggregate sales to our top five end customers, through all channels, accounted for approximately 40% of our net revenue for each of the fiscal years 2025 and 2024.”verify →
Which reported numbers are a judgment call?
Management names Revenue recognition, Income taxes, Acquisitions, Stock compensation 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, Semiconductors

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.

Company	Revenue	Gross margin	Op. margin	ROIC	Owner earn. margin
NVDANVIDIA Corp.	$215.9B	62%	32.8%	46%	44%
AVGOBroadcom Inc.	$63.9B	59%	25.4%	13%	42%
AMDAdvanced Micro Devices	$34.6B	45%	7.2%	6%	7%
JBLJabil Inc.	$29.8B	8%	3.2%	18%	2%
AMATApplied Materials Inc.	$28.4B	46%	27.9%	36%	22%
FLEXFlex Ltd.	$27.9B	7%	3.3%	15%	0%
APHAmphenol Corporation	$23.1B	32%	20.4%	18%	14%
NXPINXP Semiconductors N.V.	$12.3B	55%	24.8%	17%	21%
Group median	—	45%	22.6%	17%	17%

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 Broadcom Inc. has delivered.

Today’s price $

Through the cycle, Broadcom Inc. earns about $26.6B on its 41.6% median owner-earnings margin. This year’s 42.1% margin runs in line with that. Normalize, below, values the price on that through-cycle figure rather than the latest year.

Base Normalize · through-cycle ($26.6B) Net of stock comp (−$8.8B) Steady-state · maintenance capex ($33.0B)

—

The assumptions Required return 9% Years of high growth 10 Terminal growth 2.5%

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 · ’21→’25+12%/yr

Owner-earnings growth · ’16→’25+21%/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.

Free cash flow $32.8B on 4758M shares outstanding, per the 10-Q cover, as of 2026-05-29; net debt $47.1B. The base is the latest year by default; Normalize values it on the through-cycle median owner-earnings margin (to avoid paying on a peak year). Net of stock comp treats option pay as the expense it is. Capex ($860M) runs well above depreciation ($603M), so this is a build-out; Steady-state swaps total capex for maintenance (≈ depreciation), lifting the base to about $33.0B, the cash it would throw off if it stopped expanding. The dials set the multiple a growth belief justifies; the price, and every dollar on this page, is yours.

Weigh AVGO against another business →

The owners of AVGO: the meeting and the votes →

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

Manual order: ← AVBH its page in the Manual AVIR →

Industry order: ← ATOM the Semiconductors chapter AXTI →