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CVSA, Covista Inc.

Education Services asset-light Serial acquirer

Revenue is Chamberlain (41%), Walden (39%) and Medical and Veterinary (21%).

Latest annual: FY2025 10-K

CVSA · Covista Inc.

The business

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

Revenue · FY2025

$1.8B

+12.9% YoY · 16% 5-yr CAGR

Vital signs · TTM, with 5-yr average

Revenue $1.9B 5-yr avg $1.4B

Gross margin 57% 5-yr avg 54%

Operating margin 19.1% 5-yr avg 12.4%

ROIC 16% 5-yr avg 8%

Owner-earnings margin 19% 5-yr avg 12%

Free cash flow margin 18% 5-yr avg 12%

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: An asset-light business: the value sits in intellectual property and people, not plant, so the question is how durable the advantage is, not how high the margin.
Situation: Serial acquirer. Goodwill and acquired intangibles are 63% of assets, with meaningful acquisition spending in 4 of the record's 10 years; much of what this business is was bought, at prices the record carries.
What moves the needle: Gross margin has run about 52% and operating margin about 13% through the cycle, a wide spread between price and the cost of what it sells — whether that advantage is durable pricing power or a margin that can erode is the question the record is for. The operating margin has swung widely — from 5.6% to 19% — on a steadier 52% gross margin, so what moves it sits below the gross line, in operating spend and one-off charges more than in the cost of the product itself. The cash cycle has run negative through the cycle (a median of −11 days): the operation is paid before it pays, so working capital releases cash as the business grows rather than tying it up. On its own account, the filing leans hardest on cyclicality & demand, set against the numbers in what the filing emphasizes, below.
Is it a good business?: Return on capital has sat near the cost of capital (median 8%). The steadier read is owner earnings: roughly 16% of revenue reaches owners as cash, consistently, and customers and suppliers fund the business through negative working capital. 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.

Where the money comes from

read the 10-K →

Revenue spreads across 3 segments, the largest Chamberlain at 41%.

Revenue by reportable segment, FY2025

Chamberlain41%$726M
Walden39%$693M
Medical and Veterinary21%$369M

By geographyDomestic Operations79%Barbados, St. Kitts, and St. Maarten21%

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	TTMTTMMar 2026
											Income statement
$1.1B	$1.2B	$960M	$1.0B	$866M	$899M	$1.4B	$1.5B	$1.6B	$1.8B	$1.9B	RevenueRevenue
47%	47%	52%	53%	47%	49%	52%	55%	56%	57%	57%	Gross marginGross mgn
33%	31%	34%	35%	32%	33%	41%	40%	40%	38%	38%	SG&A / revenueSG&A/rev
$156M	$135M	$167M	$156M	$110M	$110M	$77M	$168M	$217M	$342M	$365M	Operating incomeOp. inc.
14.5%	11.2%	17.4%	15.4%	12.7%	12.3%	5.6%	11.6%	13.7%	19.1%	19.1%	Operating marginOp. mgn
($3M)	$122M	$34M	$95M	($85M)	$70M	$311M	$93M	$137M	$237M	$234M	Net incomeNet inc.
—	7%	—	26%	—	15%	-5%	10%	16%	22%	24%	Effective tax rateTax rate
											Cash flow & returns
$231M	$231M	$239M	$205M	$108M	$192M	$11M	$192M	$296M	$338M	$406M	Operating cash flowOp. cash
$43M	$46M	$33M	$34M	$32M	$34M	$45M	$41M	$40M	$41M	$43M	DepreciationDeprec.
$169M	$46M	$158M	$63M	$147M	$75M	($368M)	$43M	$93M	$19M	$88M	Working capital & otherWC & other
$51M	$43M	$47M	$58M	$40M	$40M	$31M	$26M	$49M	$50M	$70M	CapexCapex
4.8%	3.5%	4.9%	5.7%	4.6%	4.4%	2.2%	1.8%	3.1%	2.8%	3.7%	Capex / revenueCapex/rev
$180M	$188M	$206M	$171M	$68M	$152M	($20M)	$166M	$247M	$288M	$363M	Owner earningsOwner earn.
16.7%	15.6%	21.5%	16.9%	7.9%	16.9%	−1.5%	11.4%	15.6%	16.1%	19.0%	Owner earnings marginOE mgn
$180M	$188M	$193M	$147M	$68M	$152M	($20M)	$166M	$247M	$288M	$336M	Free cash flowFCF
16.7%	15.6%	20.1%	14.5%	7.9%	16.9%	−1.5%	11.4%	15.6%	16.1%	17.6%	Free cash flow marginFCF mgn
$174M	$331M	$3M	$118M	$0	$0	$1.5B	$0	$0	—	$0	AcquisitionsAcquis.
$23M	$11M	$0	$0	—	—	—	—	—	—	$0	Dividends paidDiv. paid
$33M	$49M	$137M	$253M	$137M	$100M	$120M	$123M	$262M	$213M	—	BuybacksBuybacks
—	8%	6%	7%	—	5%	4%	8%	10%	15%	16%	ROICROIC
-0%	7%	2%	7%	-7%	5%	21%	6%	10%	17%	17%	Return on equityROE
−2%	7%	2%	7%	—	—	—	—	—	—	17%	Retained to equityRetained/eq
											Balance sheet
$312M	$244M	$435M	$213M	$509M	$476M	$326M	$314M	$219M	$200M	$158M	Cash & investmentsCash+inv
$162M	$149M	$147M	$84M	$87M	$41M	$79M	$100M	$124M	$143M	$173M	ReceivablesReceiv.
$65M	$43M	$47M	$53M	$46M	$42M	$57M	$82M	$103M	$105M	$97M	Accounts payablePayables
$98M	$106M	$99M	$30M	$41M	($1M)	$22M	$18M	$21M	$38M	$76M	Operating working capitalOper. WC
$518M	$471M	$688M	$505M	$693M	$1.5B	$424M	$534M	$418M	$416M	$404M	Current assetsCur. assets
$362M	$377M	$366M	$312M	$346M	$409M	$377M	$431M	$488M	$508M	$580M	Current liabilitiesCur. liab.
1.4×	1.2×	1.9×	1.6×	2.0×	3.7×	1.1×	1.2×	0.9×	0.8×	0.7×	Current ratioCurr. ratio
$588M	$829M	$814M	$687M	$686M	$310M	$961M	$961M	$961M	$961M	$961M	GoodwillGoodwill
$2.1B	$2.3B	$2.3B	$2.2B	$2.3B	$3.1B	$2.8B	$2.8B	$2.7B	$2.8B	$2.7B	Total assetsAssets
—	$125M	$293M	$401M	$289M	$1.1B	$839M	$695M	$649M	$553M	$499M	Total debtDebt
—	($119M)	($142M)	$188M	($220M)	$594M	$513M	$381M	$429M	$353M	$342M	Net debt / (cash)Net debt
26.3×	14.8×	14.4×	7.8×	5.6×	2.7×	0.6×	2.7×	3.4×	6.5×	7.8×	Interest coverageInt. cov.
$1.6B	$1.7B	$1.5B	$1.4B	$1.3B	$1.3B	$1.5B	$1.5B	$1.4B	$1.4B	$1.4B	Shareholders’ equityEquity
2.1%	1.4%	1.5%	1.3%	1.6%	1.4%	1.6%	1.0%	1.6%	2.3%	2.2%	Stock comp / revenueSBC/rev
											Per share
64.4M	64.0M	62.3M	59.3M	54.1M	51.6M	48.4M	45.6M	40.3M	38.3M	36.0M	Shares out (diluted)Shares
$16.78	$18.87	$15.42	$17.09	$16.02	$17.41	$28.56	$31.82	$39.31	$46.65	$53.00	Revenue / shareRev/sh
$-0.05	$1.91	$0.54	$1.60	$-1.58	$1.36	$6.43	$2.05	$3.39	$6.18	$6.50	EPS (diluted)EPS
$2.80	$2.94	$3.31	$2.88	$1.26	$2.95	$-0.42	$3.64	$6.13	$7.50	$10.08	Owner earnings / shareOE/sh
$2.80	$2.94	$3.09	$2.48	$1.26	$2.95	$-0.42	$3.64	$6.13	$7.50	$9.33	Free cash flow / shareFCF/sh
$0.36	$0.18	$0.00	$0.00	—	—	—	—	—	—	$0.00	Dividends / shareDiv/sh
$0.80	$0.66	$0.75	$0.97	$0.73	$0.77	$0.64	$0.57	$1.21	$1.31	$1.94	Cap. spending / shareCapex/sh
$24.58	$26.07	$24.39	$23.45	$24.21	$25.05	$30.82	$31.96	$33.97	$37.40	$37.86	Book value / shareBVPS

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

	9-yr	5-yr
Revenue / share	+12.0%/yr	+23.8%/yr
Owner earnings / share	+11.6%/yr	+42.9%/yr
Capital spending / share	+5.7%/yr	+12.4%/yr
Book value / share	+4.8%/yr	+9.1%/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.

Walden+16.5%
“Walden revenue increased 16.5%, or $98.1 million, to $693.4 million in fiscal year 2025 compared to the prior year driven by an increase in enrollment, higher tuition rates, and an increase in average credit hours per student.”
✓ figure matches the filed record

The record, charted

FY2016–2025

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

Share count

38Mpeak FY2016

ROIC

15%low FY2022

Gross margin

57%low FY2017

Net debt ÷ owner earnings

1.2×peak FY2021

Owner earnings vs. net income

Owner earningsNet income

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

$288Mowner earningsvs.$237Mnet incomelow FY2022

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 $237M of profit into $288M 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$237M

Owner earnings$288M · 16% of revenue

	FY2025	FY2024	FY2023	FY2022	FY2021
Reported net income	$237M	$137M	$93M	$311M	$70M
Depreciation & amortizationnon-cash charge added back	+$41M	+$40M	+$41M	+$45M	+$34M
Stock-based compensationreal costnon-cash, but a real cost	+$42M	+$26M	+$14M	+$23M	+$13M
Working capital & othertiming of cash in and out, other non-cash items	+$19M	+$93M	+$43M	−$368M	+$75M
Cash from operations	$338M	$296M	$192M	$11M	$192M
Capital expenditurecash put back in to keep running and to grow	−$50M	−$49M	−$26M	−$31M	−$40M
Owner earnings	$288M	$247M	$166M	($20M)	$152M
Owner-earnings marginowner earnings ÷ revenue	16%	16%	11%	-1%	17%

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 $42M), owner earnings is nearer $246M.

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? 6.5×

Comfortable

Operating income $342M ÷ interest expense $52M

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? $344M · 1.0× operating profit

Modest net debt

Cash $200M + ST investments $9M − debt $553M

What this means
Netting $209M of cash and short-term investments against $553M of debt leaves $344M owed, about 1.0× a year's operating profit (1.6× 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? -20d

Negative, funded by others

DSO 29 + DIO 0 − DPO 50 days

What this means
Days cash is tied up between paying suppliers and collecting from customers. A negative cycle is a quiet moat: suppliers and customers fund the operation (Buffett's “float”), the company grows on other people's money. (Little or no inventory, a services / asset-light model, so the inventory leg is ~0.)

Is it a good business?

Return on invested capital 7%

Below average through the cycle

8-yr median, range 4%–15%; 15% latest = NOPAT $267M ÷ invested capital $1.8B

Industry peers: median 9%

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 8 years (it ran 15% 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 16%

High through the cycle

10-yr median margin, range -1%–21%; latest $288M = operating cash $338M − maintenance capex $50M

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 16% of revenue this year, a 16% median across 10 years. Treating stock comp as the real expense it is (less $42M of SBC) leaves $246M.
Are earnings backed by cash? 1.43×

Cash-backed

Cash from ops $338M ÷ net income $237M

In the filing’s words The filing leans on adjusted, non-GAAP earnings, but the GAAP profit is itself cash-backed — the adjustments are not papering over a cash shortfall here.

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? 74%

Returns about half

Dividends + buybacks $213M ÷ Owner Earnings $288M

What this means
Of $288M Owner Earnings, $213M (74%) went back to shareholders, $0 dividends, $213M buybacks. Net of $42M stock comp, the real buyback was about $172M. 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? 1.24×

Expanding

Capex $50M ÷ depreciation $41M

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 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 Near

Revenue ≥ $2B · $1.8B

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× · 0.82×

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 · $553M vs ($92M) 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 Miss

A profit every year (10-yr record) · 2 loss years

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

Uninterrupted dividends · 2 of 10 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.
Earnings growth Pass

Earnings +33% over the record · +206%

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 $4.58/share (latest year $6.97), the averaged base the calculator's gate runs on, and book value is $42.13/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 8 of 10

What this means
Lost money in 2 year(s), look at what happened there before trusting the average.
Return on capital ≥ 15% 0 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 14% → 15% (3-yr avg ends)

What this means
Through the cycle the operating margin held roughly steady — about 14% early, 15% lately, median 13%.
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 +4%/yr

What this means
Owner earnings grew about 4% a year over the record.
Worst year 2022 · 5.6% op. margin

What this means
Stayed profitable even in its hardest year, the resilience that survives recessions.
Share count −5.6%/yr

What this means
The share count is shrinking, buybacks are quietly growing your slice of the business.
Dividend record paid

What this means
Paid a dividend in 2 of the years on record.

Does AI threaten the moat?

Moderate contestability

AI is likely to reshape costs and some products here without clearly contesting or sparing the core moat; how the company itself frames it is the tell.

The question is whether a moat the record shows as durable outlasts a technology that lowers the cost of part of what the firm sells. The durability is read in the record above, the filing's own framing of AI beside it; the industry label decides nothing on its own.

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$404M

Cash & short-term investments$158M
Receivables$173M
Other current assets$73M

Current liabilities$580M

Debt due within a year$4M
Accounts payable$97M
Other current liabilities$479M

Current ratio0.70×all current assets ÷ what's due · Graham looked for 2×

Quick ratio0.70×stricter: inventory excluded

Cash ratio0.27×strictest: cash alone against what's due

Working capital($177M)the cushion left after near-term bills

Its current ratio is below 1, which usually reads as strain; here it is likely structural strength. This business collects from customers before it pays suppliers (a negative cash-conversion cycle), so the balance sheet is funded by that float, the way Costco's and Amazon's are. The low ratio can be the edge, not the risk; the cash-conversion cycle and the debt due above say which.

Debt due this year vs. cash$4M due · $158M 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+4.5%the freshest read on whether the business is still growing

Current ratio, recent quarters0.9× → 0.7×

Deeper floors

Tangible book value($354M)equity stripped of goodwill & intangibles

Net current asset value($970M)Graham's net-net: current assets less all liabilities

Debt incl. operating leases$736M$237M of it operating leases

Deferred revenue$305Mcustomer cash collected before delivery; operating float

From the company's latest filing.

How the cash was used, 2016–2025

Over the record, the business generated $2.0B of operating cash; how management split it reads as a cash returner, paying most of what it earns straight back to owners.

Reinvested$434M · 21%
Dividends$34M · 2%
Buybacks$1.4B · 70%
Retained (debt / cash)$148M · 7%

Returned to owners$1.5B
89% of the owner earnings the business produced over the span, $34M as dividends and $1.4B as buybacks.
Average price paid for buybacks$40.56
Across the years where the filing reports a share count, 12M shares were bought for $490M, about $40.56 each. Year to year the price paid ranged from $34.13 (2021) to $47.65 (2019), and 2019, near the top of that range, was also its heaviest buyback year ($253M).
Net change in share count−44.0%
The diluted count fell from 64M to 36M, so the buybacks outran the stock issued to staff.
Dividend record$0.00/sh
Paid in 2 of the years on record. It was cut at least once along the way.

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$1.7B63% of all assets; the premium carried on the balance sheet for businesses acquired

Against book equity67%goodwill is this share of book equity; the rest is the company’s own retained and paid-in capital

Cash spent acquiring$2.1Bover 10 years buying other businesses, against $434M of capital spent building

$99M written down across 1 year (2016): 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 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	Stephen W. Beard	$8.5M	$10.4M	$152M
2022	Stephen W. Beard	$6.3M	$6.8M	($20M)
2022	Stephen W. Beard	$9.2M	$9.0M	($20M)
2023	Stephen W. Beard	$8.1M	$8.4M	$166M
2024	Stephen W. Beard	$14.3M	$30.0M	$247M
2025	Stephen W. Beard	$17.2M	$120.4M	$288M

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 ownership2.5%
The stake all directors and executive officers hold together, per the 2025 proxy: skin in the game, the first thing Munger reads.
CEO pay ratio341:1
What the chief earns for every dollar the median employee makes, per the 2025 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$42M
The slice of the business handed to employees in shares this year, 2% of revenue, equal to 12% 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 Covista 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.

1 of the 5 tests turned up something to look into; the other 4 came back clean.

Look hereIs it less profitable than it was?14.4% vs 17.9%
The owner-earnings margin averaged 17.9% early in the record and 14.4% across the last three years, and the latest year has not recovered. Ask the filing whether that is a structural drift or a cyclical trough — price, mix, cost, or a competitor — and whether it is permanent.

And these came back clean

Did the share count rise anyway?
Did reported profit become cash?
Did receivables and inventory outpace sales?
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 Income taxes, Credit & receivables, Contingencies 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, nearest by economic model

No close industry peers in the catalog yet, so these are the nearest by economic model (asset-light compounder), compared 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
UUnity Software	$1.8B	76%	-36.8%	-15%	-6%
AEISAdvanced Energy Industries Inc.	$1.8B	38%	11.4%	19%	9%
CVSACovista Inc.	$1.8B	52%	13.2%	8%	16%
ACIWACI Worldwide Inc.	$1.8B	51%	14.8%	7%	13%
PEGAPegasystems	$1.7B	71%	1.9%	3%	7%
OSISOSI Systems Inc. Common Stock (DE)	$1.7B	35%	9.6%	11%	6%
WLYJohn Wiley & Sons Inc.	$1.7B	69%	11.4%	9%	11%
APEIAmerican Public Education Inc.	$649M	60%	7.3%	13%	9%
Group median	—	56%	10.5%	8%	9%

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 Covista Inc. has delivered.

Today’s price $

Through the cycle, Covista Inc. earns about $283M on its 15.8% median owner-earnings margin. This year’s 16.1% 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 ($283M) Net of stock comp (−$42M) Steady-state · maintenance capex ($356M)

—

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+42%/yr

Owner-earnings growth · ’16→’25+4%/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 $336M on 34M shares outstanding, per the 10-Q cover, as of 2026-05-01; net debt $342M. The if-converted diluted count is 36M, 6% above the shares outstanding: the dilution overhang (convertibles, options) a buyer inherits. 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 ($70M) runs well above depreciation ($43M), so this is a build-out; Steady-state swaps total capex for maintenance (≈ depreciation), lifting the base to about $356M, 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 CVSA against another business →

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

Manual order: ← CVS its page in the Manual CVX →

Industry order: ← COE the Education Services chapter DAO →