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GEN, Gen Digital

Software asset-light CyclicalSerial acquirer

Gen helps people protect what matters most — their data, identity, privacy, reputation and financials — through award-winning cyber-security, online privacy, identity protection and financial wellness solutions used by nearly 500 million users in more than 150 countries.

We create innovative and easy-to-use technology solutions that help people grow, manage and secure their digital and financial lives.

Gen Digital Inc. is a global leader in consumer Cyber Safety and Trust-Based Solutions, empowering people around the world to live safer digital lives while building confidence and control over their financial futures.

Latest annual: FY2026 10-K

GEN · Gen Digital

The business

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

Revenue · FY2026

$5.0B

+27.1% YoY · 14% 5-yr CAGR

Vital signs · TTM, with 5-yr average

Revenue $5.0B 5-yr avg $3.8B

Gross margin 78% 5-yr avg 81%

Operating margin 42.4% 5-yr avg 37.0%

ROIC 13% 5-yr avg 19%

Owner-earnings margin 30% 5-yr avg 34%

Free cash flow margin 30% 5-yr avg 34%

The business in brief

read the 10-K →

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

Situation: Cyclical. Margins collapse and recover repeatedly across the record; a single year, good or bad, misstates the through-cycle earning power. Serial acquirer. Goodwill and acquired intangibles are 84% of assets, with meaningful acquisition spending in 7 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 81% and operating margin about 29% 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 −6.0% to 42% — on a steadier 81% 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 −28 days): the operation is paid before it pays, so working capital releases cash as the business grows rather than tying it up. Read this kind of business on retention and the cost of growth. 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 sat near the cost of capital (median 11%). The steadier read is owner earnings: roughly 31% of revenue reaches owners as cash, though it swings, and customers and suppliers fund the business through negative working capital. The cycle and the balance sheet decide this one; the worst year tells more than the median, and 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 →

Americas is 71% of revenue, so this is largely a single-region business.

Revenue by geography, FY2026

Americas71%$3.5B
EMEA21%$1.1B
Asia Pacific8%$406M

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, 2017–2026

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	2026’26	TTMTTMApr 2026
											Income statement
$4.0B	$2.6B	$2.5B	$2.5B	$2.6B	$2.8B	$3.3B	$3.8B	$3.9B	$5.0B	$5.0B	RevenueRevenue
79%	82%	81%	84%	86%	85%	82%	81%	80%	78%	78%	Gross marginGross mgn
14%	19%	17%	15%	8%	14%	9%	16%	7%	—	5%	SG&A / revenueSG&A/rev
20%	18%	17%	13%	10%	9%	9%	9%	8%	8%	8%	R&D / revenueR&D/rev
($100M)	($154M)	$158M	$355M	$896M	$1.0B	$1.2B	$1.1B	$1.6B	$2.1B	$2.1B	Operating incomeOp. inc.
−2.5%	−6.0%	6.4%	14.3%	35.1%	35.9%	36.4%	29.2%	40.9%	42.4%	42.4%	Operating marginOp. mgn
($106M)	$1.1B	$31M	$3.9B	$554M	$836M	$1.3B	$607M	$643M	$973M	$973M	Net incomeNet inc.
—	—	9%	6%	24%	20%	—	—	38%	36%	36%	Effective tax rateTax rate
											Cash flow & returns
($209M)	$950M	$1.5B	($861M)	$706M	$974M	$757M	$2.1B	$1.2B	$1.5B	$1.5B	Operating cash flowOp. cash
$492M	$640M	$615M	$361M	$150M	$140M	$329M	$485M	$419M	$493M	$493M	DepreciationDeprec.
($1.0B)	($1.4B)	$497M	($5.4B)	($79M)	($72M)	($1.0B)	$834M	$26M	($158M)	($158M)	Working capital & otherWC & other
$70M	$142M	$207M	$89M	$6M	$6M	$6M	$20M	$15M	$22M	$22M	CapexCapex
1.7%	5.5%	8.4%	3.6%	0.2%	0.2%	0.2%	0.5%	0.4%	0.4%	0.4%	Capex / revenueCapex/rev
($279M)	$808M	$1.3B	($950M)	$700M	$968M	$751M	$2.0B	$1.2B	$1.5B	$1.5B	Owner earningsOwner earn.
−6.9%	31.6%	52.4%	−38.2%	27.4%	34.6%	22.6%	53.8%	30.6%	30.5%	30.5%	Owner earnings marginOE mgn
($279M)	$808M	$1.3B	($950M)	$700M	$968M	$751M	$2.0B	$1.2B	$1.5B	$1.5B	Free cash flowFCF
−6.9%	31.6%	52.4%	−38.2%	27.4%	34.6%	22.6%	53.8%	30.6%	30.5%	30.5%	Free cash flow marginFCF mgn
$6.7B	$401M	$180M	$0	$344M	$39M	$6.5B	$0	$84M	$1.0B	$1.0B	AcquisitionsAcquis.
$222M	$211M	$217M	$7.5B	$373M	$303M	$314M	$323M	$313M	$312M	$312M	Dividends paidDiv. paid
$500M	$0	$234M	$1.6B	$304M	$0	$904M	$441M	$272M	$634M	—	BuybacksBuybacks
-1%	-2%	2%	16%	31%	47%	11%	11%	11%	13%	13%	ROICROIC
-3%	23%	1%	38870%	—	—	62%	28%	28%	37%	37%	Return on equityROE
−9%	18%	−3%	n/m	—	—	47%	13%	15%	25%	25%	Retained to equityRetained/eq
											Balance sheet
$4.3B	$2.2B	$2.0B	$2.3B	$951M	$1.9B	$750M	$846M	$1.0B	$411M	$411M	Cash & investmentsCash+inv
$649M	$809M	$708M	$111M	$117M	$120M	$168M	$163M	$171M	$361M	$361M	ReceivablesReceiv.
$180M	$168M	$165M	$87M	$52M	$63M	$77M	$66M	$94M	$96M	$96M	Accounts payablePayables
$469M	$641M	$543M	$24M	$65M	$57M	$91M	$97M	$77M	$265M	$277M	Operating working capitalOper. WC
$5.3B	$3.5B	$3.2B	$3.1B	$1.5B	$2.3B	$1.2B	$1.4B	$1.4B	$1.1B	$1.1B	Current assetsCur. assets
$4.6B	$3.2B	$3.8B	$2.6B	$2.1B	$3.1B	$2.8B	$2.7B	$2.9B	$2.7B	$2.7B	Current liabilitiesCur. liab.
1.2×	1.1×	0.8×	1.2×	0.7×	0.7×	0.4×	0.5×	0.5×	0.4×	0.4×	Current ratioCurr. ratio
$5.5B	$2.7B	$2.7B	$2.6B	$2.9B	$2.9B	$10.2B	$10.2B	$10.2B	$11.0B	$11.0B	GoodwillGoodwill
$18.2B	$15.8B	$15.9B	$7.7B	$6.4B	$6.9B	$15.9B	$15.8B	$15.5B	$15.6B	$15.6B	Total assetsAssets
$8.2B	$5.0B	$4.5B	$4.2B	$3.6B	$3.7B	$9.8B	$8.6B	$8.3B	$8.2B	$8.2B	Total debtDebt
$3.9B	$2.9B	$2.4B	$2.0B	$2.6B	$1.8B	$9.0B	$7.8B	$7.3B	$7.8B	$7.8B	Net debt / (cash)Net debt
-0.5×	-0.6×	0.8×	1.8×	6.2×	8.0×	3.0×	1.7×	2.8×	3.7×	3.7×	Interest coverageInt. cov.
$3.5B	$5.0B	$5.7B	$10M	($500M)	($126M)	$2.2B	$2.1B	$2.3B	$2.6B	$2.6B	Shareholders’ equityEquity
10.9%	23.8%	14.3%	12.5%	3.2%	2.5%	4.0%	3.6%	3.4%	4.7%	4.7%	Stock comp / revenueSBC/rev
											Per share
618M	668M	632M	643M	600M	591M	624M	642M	624M	619M	619M	Shares out (diluted)Shares
$6.50	$3.83	$3.89	$3.87	$4.25	$4.73	$5.32	$5.92	$6.31	$8.08	$8.08	Revenue / shareRev/sh
$-0.17	$1.70	$0.05	$6.05	$0.92	$1.41	$2.14	$0.95	$1.03	$1.57	$1.57	EPS (diluted)EPS
$-0.45	$1.21	$2.04	$-1.48	$1.17	$1.64	$1.20	$3.18	$1.93	$2.46	$2.46	Owner earnings / shareOE/sh
$-0.45	$1.21	$2.04	$-1.48	$1.17	$1.64	$1.20	$3.18	$1.93	$2.46	$2.46	Free cash flow / shareFCF/sh
$0.36	$0.32	$0.34	$11.63	$0.62	$0.51	$0.50	$0.50	$0.50	$0.50	$0.50	Dividends / shareDiv/sh
$0.11	$0.21	$0.33	$0.14	$0.01	$0.01	$0.01	$0.03	$0.02	$0.04	$0.04	Cap. spending / shareCapex/sh
$5.64	$7.52	$9.08	$0.02	$-0.83	$-0.21	$3.45	$3.33	$3.64	$4.22	$4.22	Book value / shareBVPS

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

	9-yr	5-yr
Revenue / share	+2.4%/yr	+13.7%/yr
Owner earnings / share	—	+16.1%/yr
EPS	—	+11.2%/yr
Dividends / share	+3.8%/yr	−4.1%/yr
Capital spending / share	−12.1%/yr	+28.9%/yr
Book value / share	−3.2%/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.

Revenue+27.1%
“Net revenues Fiscal Year % Change (In millions, except for percentages) 2026 2025 2026 vs. 2025 Net revenues $ 5,000 $ 3,935 27 % Fiscal 2026 compared to fiscal 2025 Net revenues increased $1,065 million, due to a $163 million increase in sales of our Cyber Safety Platform products and a $902 million increase in sales of our Trust-Based Solutions, including a $823 million increase in Trust-Based Solutions due to the acquisition of MoneyLion.”
✓ figure matches the filed record

The record, charted

FY2017–2026

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

Share count

619Mpeak FY2018

ROIC

13%low FY2018

Gross margin

78%low FY2026

Net debt ÷ owner earnings

5.1×peak FY2023

Owner earnings vs. net income

Owner earningsNet income

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

$1.5Bowner earningsvs.$973Mnet incomelow FY2020

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.

FY2018FY2026

Owner-earnings bridge

FY2022–FY2026cash-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 2026 the business turned $973M of profit into $1.5B 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$973M

Owner earnings$1.5B · 30% of revenue

	FY2026	FY2025	FY2024	FY2023	FY2022
Reported net income	$973M	$643M	$607M	$1.3B	$836M
Depreciation & amortizationnon-cash charge added back	+$493M	+$419M	+$485M	+$329M	+$140M
Stock-based compensationreal costnon-cash, but a real cost	+$237M	+$133M	+$138M	+$134M	+$70M
Working capital & othertiming of cash in and out, other non-cash items	−$158M	+$26M	+$834M	−$1.0B	−$72M
Cash from operations	$1.5B	$1.2B	$2.1B	$757M	$974M
Capital expenditurecash put back in to keep running and to grow	−$22M	−$15M	−$20M	−$6M	−$6M
Owner earnings	$1.5B	$1.2B	$2.0B	$751M	$968M
Owner-earnings marginowner earnings ÷ revenue	30%	31%	54%	23%	35%

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 $237M), owner earnings is nearer $1.3B.

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

FY2026 10-K · source on SEC EDGAR →

Will it survive?

Can it pay its interest? 3.7×

Adequate

Operating income $2.1B ÷ interest expense $569M

What this means
Comfortable in a normal year, but below the margin of safety Graham looked for. Worth checking how stable the coverage has been across a full cycle.
How heavy is the debt, net of cash? $7.8B · 3.7× operating profit

Meaningful net debt

Cash $411M − debt $8.2B

What this means
Netting $411M of cash and short-term investments against $8.2B of debt leaves $7.8B owed, about 3.7× a year's operating profit (3.9× 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? -1d

Negative, funded by others

DSO 26 + DIO 5 − DPO 33 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.

Is it a good business?

Return on invested capital 11%

Solid through the cycle

10-yr median, range -2%–47%; 13% latest = NOPAT $1.4B ÷ invested capital $10.4B

Industry peers: median -7%

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 10 years (it ran 13% 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 30%

High through the cycle

10-yr median margin, range -38%–54%; latest $1.5B = operating cash $1.5B − maintenance capex $22M

Industry peers: median 18%

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 30% of revenue this year, a 30% median across 10 years. Treating stock comp as the real expense it is (less $237M of SBC) leaves $1.3B.
Are earnings backed by cash? 1.59×

Cash-backed

Cash from ops $1.5B ÷ net income $973M

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? 62%

Returns about half

Dividends + buybacks $946M ÷ Owner Earnings $1.5B

What this means
Of $1.5B Owner Earnings, $946M (62%) went back to shareholders, $312M dividends, $634M buybacks. Net of $237M stock comp, the real buyback was about $397M. 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? 0.04×

Harvesting

Capex $22M ÷ depreciation $493M

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 · $5.0B

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× · 0.40×

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 · $8.2B vs ($1.6B) 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 · +109%

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 $1.23/share (latest year $1.62), the averaged base the calculator's gate runs on, and book value is $4.33/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, 2017–2026

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% 3 of 10 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 −1% → 38% (3-yr avg ends)

What this means
Through the cycle the operating margin widened — about −1% early to 38% lately, median 29% — pricing power intact or improving.
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 +20%/yr

What this means
Owner earnings grew about 20% a year over the record.
Worst year 2018 · −6.0% op. margin

What this means
Operations went underwater in 2018, understand why before trusting the good years.
Share count +0.0%/yr

What this means
Roughly flat share count, little dilution, little buyback.
Dividend record rising

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

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 A competitive risk, new this year

Its FY2026 10-K names artificial intelligence as a competitive threat, in language that was not in the prior year's filing.

“We have incurred, and will continue to incur, significant research and development expenses, including investments in AI, to drive organic growth and reduce reliance on third-party technologies.”

AI has collapsed the cost of building a capable substitute for the very thing this business sells. When a credible alternative can be assembled for a fraction of the incumbent's price, it is pricing power that erodes first, not revenue tomorrow. The live question is whether the moat survives that, not whether it held in the past. Whether that question is answerable at all is yours to decide, against your own circle of competence.

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 fiscal year-end, Apr 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$1.1B

Cash & short-term investments$411M
Receivables$361M
Inventory$12M
Other current assets$297M

Current liabilities$2.7B

Debt due within a year$181M
Accounts payable$96M
Other current liabilities$2.4B

Current ratio0.40×all current assets ÷ what's due · Graham looked for 2×

Quick ratio0.39×stricter: inventory excluded

Cash ratio0.15×strictest: cash alone against what's due

Working capital($1.6B)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$181M due · $411M cash covered by cash on hand, no refinancing forced · both figures from the Apr 3, 2026 balance sheet

Revenue, latest quarter vs. a year ago+25.8%the freshest read on whether the business is still growing

Current ratio, recent quarters0.3× → 0.4×

Deeper floors

Tangible book value($10.5B)equity stripped of goodwill & intangibles

Net current asset value($11.9B)Graham's net-net: current assets less all liabilities

Debt incl. operating leases$8.3B$64M of it operating leases

Deferred revenue$2.0Bcustomer 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.

'27$181M

'28$1.1B

'29$181M

'30$2.4B

'31$2.8B

later$1.7B

Bars scaled to the largest single year; “later” is everything due after 2031, shown apart since it dwarfs the years.

Due in the next 12 months$181Mthe first rung: what must be repaid or rolled over within the year

Within two years$1.3Bthe near wall, the part most exposed to today’s credit conditions

Biggest single year$2.8Bin 2031the lumpiest maturity, where a refinancing, if needed, is largest

Total scheduled principal$8.3Bevery year plus what lies beyond, as the footnote totals it

Against what the business has and earns

Cash & short-term investments, Apr 3, 2026$411M

One year of owner earnings (FY2026)$1.5B

Together, against $181M due next year10.7×

Cash on hand as of Apr 3, 2026 plus a year’s owner earnings comes to $1.9B against the $181M due in the twelve months after the Apr 3, 2026 schedule: 11 times it.

Maturity schedule extracted from the company’s Apr 3, 2026 annual report and reconciled to the total the table states.

How the cash was used, 2017–2026

Over the record, the business generated $8.6B of operating cash; how management split it reads as a cash returner, paying most of what it earns straight back to owners.

Reinvested$583M · 7%
Dividends$10.1B · 117%
Buybacks$4.9B · 56%

Returned to owners$14.9B
185% of the owner earnings the business produced over the span, $10.1B as dividends and $4.9B as buybacks.
Source of funding−$6.9B
Reinvestment and shareholder returns ran $6.9B beyond the operating cash the business generated, so the gap was financed off the balance sheet: cash and short-term investments drew down $3.8B.
Average price paid for buybacks$22.88
Across the years where the filing reports a share count, 191M shares were bought for $4.4B, about $22.88 each. Year to year the price paid ranged from $20.27 (2021) to $25.36 (2026); its heaviest year, 2020, paid $23.25 ($1.6B).
Net change in share count0.2%
The diluted count barely moved (618M to 619M): buybacks roughly offset the stock issued to staff.
Dividend record$0.50/sh
Paid in 10 of the years on record, the per-share dividend growing about 4% a year. 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$13.1B84% 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$15.4Bover 10 years buying other businesses, against $583M 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	Vincent Pilette	$13.8M	$24.2M	$700M
2022	Vincent Pilette	$13.5M	$20.7M	$968M
2023	Vincent Pilette	$25.3M	$5.7M	$751M
2024	Vincent Pilette	$15.4M	$29.3M	$2.0B
2025	Vincent Pilette	$22.5M	$33.5M	$1.2B

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 ownership9.3%
The stake all directors and executive officers hold together, per the 2025 proxy: skin in the game, the first thing Munger reads.
CEO pay ratio276:1
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$237M
The slice of the business handed to employees in shares this year, 5% of revenue, equal to 11% 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 Gen Digital 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 2017–2026.

1 of the 6 tests turned up something to look into; the other 5 came back clean.

Look hereAre "one-time" charges a yearly habit?7 of 10 years
Management took an impairment or write-down in 7 of the last 10 years, $342M 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 the share count rise anyway?
Did debt outgrow the business?
Did reported profit become cash?
Did receivables and inventory outpace sales?

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, FY2026

read the 10-K →

Which reported numbers are a judgment call?
Management names Income taxes, Stock compensation, 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, Software

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
CDNSCadence Design Systems Inc.	$5.3B	99%	24.1%	28%	28%
TEAMAtlassian	$5.2B	83%	-2.5%	—	27%
TWLOTwilio Inc.	$5.1B	52%	-19.4%	-7%	-1%
GENGen Digital	$5.0B	82%	32.2%	11%	31%
RBLXRoblox Corporation	$4.9B	76%	-28.8%	-247%	18%
CRWDCrowdStrike Holdings Inc.	$4.8B	74%	-9.8%	—	31%
SNOWSnowflake Inc.	$4.7B	64%	-49.7%	-20%	16%
PLTRPalantir Technologies Inc.	$4.5B	78%	-17.6%	7%	16%
Group median	—	77%	-13.7%	0%	23%

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 Gen Digital has delivered.

Today’s price $

Through the cycle, Gen Digital earns about $1.5B on its 30.6% median owner-earnings margin. This year’s 30.5% 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 ($1.5B) Net of stock comp (−$237M)

—

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 · ’22→’26+12%/yr

Owner-earnings growth · ’17→’26+20%/yr

Owner-earnings yield—

P/E (3-yr earnings ’24–’26)—

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 $1.5B on 602M shares outstanding, per the 10-K cover, as of 2026-05-18; net debt $7.8B. 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. The dials set the multiple a growth belief justifies; the price, and every dollar on this page, is yours.

Weigh GEN against another business →

The owners of GEN: the meeting and the votes →

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

Manual order: ← GEMI its page in the Manual GENVR →

Industry order: ← GEGGL the Software chapter GENVR →