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GRVY, GRAVITY CO., LTD.
Gravity is an online and mobile games developer and publisher based in Korea.
Our historical principal product, Ragnarok Online, is an online game available in 91 markets.
The business
What it sells, where the money comes from, the kind of company it is.
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 Micro-transaction revenue (82%), Royalties and license fees (15%) and Others (4%).
- Situation
- Cyclical. Margins collapse and recover repeatedly across the record; a single year, good or bad, misstates the through-cycle earning power.
- What moves the needle
- Gross margin has run about 33% and operating margin about 13% through the cycle, a spread the cycle sets more than the company does. The margin is cyclical, swinging between −48% and 23% over the years, so the through-cycle figure carries more than any single year — and the balance sheet at the trough more than the peak. The cash cycle has run negative through the cycle (a median of −86 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.
Every line is arithmetic on the company's filings, shown in full in the sections below.
Where the money comes from
read the 20-F →Micro-transaction revenue is 82% of revenue, with Royalties and license fees the other meaningful line at 15%.
- Micro-transaction revenue82%₩410.0B
- Royalties and license fees15%₩72.7B
- Others4%₩18.2B
From the segment footnote of the company's own 20-F. 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, 2015–2024
realized figures from each filing · older years to the left| 2015’15 | 2016’16 | 2017’17 | 2018’18 | 2019’19 | 2020’20 | 2021’21 | 2022’22 | 2023’23 | 2024’24 | TTMTTMDec 2024 | |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Income statement | |||||||||||
| ₩35.7B | ₩51.4B | ₩141.6B | ₩286.8B | ₩361.0B | ₩406.0B | ₩413.9B | ₩463.6B | ₩725.5B | ₩500.8B | ₩500.8B | RevenueRevenue |
| 15% | 42% | 33% | 27% | 26% | 41% | 46% | 42% | 33% | 39% | 39% | Gross marginGross mgn |
| (₩17.2B) | ₩3.8B | ₩14.0B | ₩33.4B | ₩48.7B | ₩88.4B | ₩96.7B | ₩104.7B | ₩160.4B | ₩85.4B | ₩85.4B | Operating incomeOp. inc. |
| −48.3% | 7.5% | 9.9% | 11.6% | 13.5% | 21.8% | 23.4% | 22.6% | 22.1% | 17.0% | 17.0% | Operating marginOp. mgn |
| (₩17.0B) | ₩657M | ₩13.3B | ₩31.4B | ₩39.9B | ₩62.7B | ₩65.9B | ₩83.2B | ₩132.0B | ₩84.9B | ₩84.9B | Net incomeNet inc. |
| — | — | 8% | 9% | 22% | 29% | 34% | 24% | 22% | 20% | 20% | Effective tax rateTax rate |
| Cash flow & returns | |||||||||||
| (₩6.0B) | ₩2.5B | ₩26.1B | ₩36.0B | ₩26.4B | ₩69.9B | ₩74.2B | ₩98.3B | ₩132.4B | ₩78.6B | ₩78.6B | Operating cash flowOp. cash |
| ₩4.8B | ₩516M | ₩520M | ₩1.4B | ₩3.7B | ₩4.9B | ₩6.3B | ₩5.1B | ₩5.3B | ₩6.0B | ₩6.3B | DepreciationDeprec. |
| ₩6.3B | ₩1.3B | ₩12.3B | ₩3.1B | (₩17.2B) | ₩2.2B | ₩1.9B | ₩10.0B | (₩4.8B) | (₩12.4B) | (₩12.7B) | Working capital & otherWC & other |
| ₩418M | ₩154M | ₩899M | ₩1.1B | ₩983M | ₩1.1B | ₩1.7B | ₩739M | ₩2.5B | ₩614M | ₩614M | CapexCapex |
| 1.2% | 0.3% | 0.6% | 0.4% | 0.3% | 0.3% | 0.4% | 0.2% | 0.3% | 0.1% | 0.1% | Capex / revenueCapex/rev |
| (₩6.4B) | ₩2.3B | ₩25.6B | ₩34.8B | ₩25.4B | ₩68.8B | ₩72.4B | ₩97.5B | ₩130.0B | ₩77.9B | ₩77.9B | Owner earningsOwner earn. |
| −17.9% | 4.6% | 18.1% | 12.1% | 7.0% | 16.9% | 17.5% | 21.0% | 17.9% | 15.6% | 15.6% | Owner earnings marginOE mgn |
| (₩6.4B) | ₩2.3B | ₩25.2B | ₩34.8B | ₩25.4B | ₩68.8B | ₩72.4B | ₩97.5B | ₩130.0B | ₩77.9B | ₩77.9B | Free cash flowFCF |
| −17.9% | 4.6% | 17.8% | 12.1% | 7.0% | 16.9% | 17.5% | 21.0% | 17.9% | 15.6% | 15.6% | Free cash flow marginFCF mgn |
| -57% | 2% | 30% | 41% | 35% | 35% | 27% | 25% | 29% | 15% | 15% | Return on equityROE |
| −57% | 2% | 30% | 41% | 35% | 35% | 27% | 25% | 29% | 15% | 15% | Retained to equityRetained/eq |
| Balance sheet | |||||||||||
| ₩36.4B | ₩28.2B | ₩61.6B | ₩86.1B | ₩79.7B | ₩111.5B | ₩99.7B | ₩173.2B | ₩188.5B | ₩235.5B | ₩251.4B | Cash & investmentsCash+inv |
| ₩5.3B | ₩5.3B | ₩42.2B | ₩60.7B | ₩32.3B | ₩59.8B | ₩52.6B | ₩77.3B | ₩71.2B | ₩81.2B | ₩81.2B | ReceivablesReceiv. |
| ₩3.0B | ₩10.0B | — | — | — | — | — | — | — | — | ₩10.0B | Accounts payablePayables |
| ₩2.3B | (₩4.7B) | ₩42.2B | ₩60.7B | ₩32.3B | ₩59.8B | ₩52.6B | ₩77.3B | ₩71.2B | ₩81.2B | ₩71.1B | Operating working capitalOper. WC |
| ₩43.7B | ₩43.5B | ₩108.9B | ₩160.2B | ₩155.9B | ₩246.6B | ₩306.1B | ₩421.8B | ₩546.9B | ₩653.6B | ₩653.6B | Current assetsCur. assets |
| ₩8.8B | ₩8.8B | ₩64.7B | ₩93.5B | ₩55.8B | ₩82.7B | ₩74.0B | ₩105.7B | ₩106.4B | ₩108.6B | ₩108.6B | Current liabilitiesCur. liab. |
| 5.0× | 4.9× | 1.7× | 1.7× | 2.8× | 3.0× | 4.1× | 4.0× | 5.1× | 6.0× | 6.0× | Current ratioCurr. ratio |
| ₩0 | ₩0 | — | — | — | — | — | — | — | — | ₩0 | GoodwillGoodwill |
| ₩45.7B | ₩45.9B | ₩115.9B | ₩173.2B | ₩175.4B | ₩265.4B | ₩327.5B | ₩444.1B | ₩578.2B | ₩686.5B | ₩686.5B | Total assetsAssets |
| -4307.3× | 2.3× | 9.7× | 33.3× | 30.5× | 23.1× | 36.0× | 9.7× | 10.7× | 8.6× | 8.6× | Interest coverageInt. cov. |
| ₩30.1B | ₩30.6B | ₩44.6B | ₩76.2B | ₩115.5B | ₩176.9B | ₩246.1B | ₩329.5B | ₩463.1B | ₩567.7B | ₩567.7B | Shareholders’ equityEquity |
| Per share | |||||||||||
| 6.9M | 6.9M | 6.9M | 6.9M | 6.9M | 6.9M | 6.9M | 6.9M | 6.9M | 6.9M | 0K | Shares out (diluted)Shares |
| ₩5131.75 | ₩7396.28 | ₩20380.64 | ₩41268.40 | ₩51945.92 | ₩58419.75 | ₩59568.85 | ₩66718.19 | ₩104407.32 | ₩72075.44 | — | Revenue / shareRev/sh |
| ₩-2450.60 | ₩94.55 | ₩1916.71 | ₩4524.89 | ₩5738.46 | ₩9023.44 | ₩9490.28 | ₩11967.65 | ₩18998.55 | ₩12220.50 | — | EPS (diluted)EPS |
| ₩-920.43 | ₩336.74 | ₩3686.34 | ₩5012.45 | ₩3653.53 | ₩9898.69 | ₩10424.10 | ₩14036.61 | ₩18703.54 | ₩11216.31 | — | Owner earnings / shareOE/sh |
| ₩-920.43 | ₩336.74 | ₩3631.80 | ₩5012.45 | ₩3653.53 | ₩9898.69 | ₩10424.10 | ₩14036.61 | ₩18703.54 | ₩11216.31 | — | Free cash flow / shareFCF/sh |
| ₩60.15 | ₩22.16 | ₩129.37 | ₩164.20 | ₩141.46 | ₩154.13 | ₩251.41 | ₩106.35 | ₩354.16 | ₩88.36 | — | Cap. spending / shareCapex/sh |
| ₩4336.95 | ₩4407.03 | ₩6412.53 | ₩10959.72 | ₩16627.67 | ₩25458.71 | ₩35411.36 | ₩47421.46 | ₩66641.77 | ₩81692.35 | — | Book value / shareBVPS |
| 9-yr | 5-yr | |
|---|---|---|
| Revenue / share | +34.1%/yr | +6.8%/yr |
| Owner earnings / share | — | +25.1%/yr |
| EPS | — | +16.3%/yr |
| Capital spending / share | +4.4%/yr | −9.0%/yr |
| Book value / share | +38.6%/yr | +37.5%/yr |
The record, charted
FY2015–2024Each measure over its full record; the current point and the worst year marked.
Owner earnings vs. net income
Owner earningsNet incomeThe accountant's number, and the cash an owner can take; the gap is the tell.
Where the cash went
ReinvestBuybacksDividendsAcquisitionsRetainedEach year's operating cash, by what management did with it: the mix, and how it drifts.
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 2024 the business reported ₩84.9B of profit but ₩77.9B of owner earnings: ₩7.0B less than the profit line, taken out by capital spending and the timing of cash.
| FY2024 | FY2023 | FY2022 | FY2021 | FY2020 | |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Reported net income | ₩84.9B | ₩132.0B | ₩83.2B | ₩65.9B | ₩62.7B |
| Depreciation & amortizationnon-cash charge added back | +₩6.0B | +₩5.3B | +₩5.1B | +₩6.3B | +₩4.9B |
| Working capital & othertiming of cash in and out, other non-cash items | −₩12.4B | −₩4.8B | +₩10.0B | +₩1.9B | +₩2.2B |
| Cash from operations | ₩78.6B | ₩132.4B | ₩98.3B | ₩74.2B | ₩69.9B |
| Capital expenditurecash put back in to keep running and to grow | −₩614M | −₩2.5B | −₩739M | −₩1.7B | −₩1.1B |
| Owner earnings | ₩77.9B | ₩130.0B | ₩97.5B | ₩72.4B | ₩68.8B |
| Owner-earnings marginowner earnings ÷ revenue | 16% | 18% | 21% | 17% | 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 .
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.
Quality & stewardship
Returns, the balance sheet, capital allocation, and pay.
Owner’s Scorecard
Will it survive?
- ComfortableOperating income ₩85.4B ÷ interest expense ₩9.9B
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.
- Debt under-captured — leverage unknown, not low
What this means
This company pays far more interest than its tagged debt implies (the rest sits under segment dimensions the data source strips), so its net cash or net debt cannot be read honestly: the gap is unknown, not zero, and 'net cash' here would be exactly the fiction the figure is meant to prevent. Judge it on the record and owner earnings instead.
- TightDSO 59 + DIO 0 − DPO 12 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. (Little or no inventory, a services / asset-light model, so the inventory leg is ~0.)
Is it a good business?
- Debt under-capturedIndustry peers: median 21%
What this means
This company's interest bill implies far more debt than its filings tag at the consolidated level (the rest sits under segment dimensions the data source strips), so invested capital, and the return on it, cannot be read honestly. Judge this one on Owner Earnings and the record instead.
- High through the cycle10-yr median margin, range -18%–21%; latest ₩77.9B = operating cash ₩78.6B − maintenance capex ₩614MIndustry peers: median 22%
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.
- Mostly cash-backedCash from ops ₩78.6B ÷ net income ₩84.9B
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?
- Not enough data
What this means
The filing data didn't include the inputs for this check.
- Investing or harvesting? 0.10×HarvestingCapex ₩614M ÷ depreciation ₩6.3B
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 3 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 —Revenue ≥ $2B (a dollar floor) · ₩500.8B
What this means
Big enough to weather a storm. Graham's floor is a dollar figure — about $2B of revenue as a conservative modern stand-in. This company reports in its home currency and we carry no exchange rate, so we show the figure and leave the size bar for you to apply rather than convert it with a number we don't have.
- Strong liquidity PassCurrent ratio ≥ 2× · 6.02×
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 —Debt ≤ working capital · —
What this means
The filings tag only a fraction of the debt this company's interest bill implies (much of it sits under segment dimensions the data source strips), so this test can't be run honestly.
- Earnings stability NearA 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 MissUninterrupted dividends · none paid
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 —Earnings +33% over the record · —
What this means
Earnings were negative early in the record, a growth rate isn't meaningful.
- 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 ₩14395.56/share (latest year ₩12220.50), the averaged base the calculator's gate runs on, and book value is ₩81692.35/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, 2015–2024
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.
- Operating margin −10% → 21% (3-yr avg ends)
What this means
Through the cycle the operating margin widened — about −10% early to 21% lately, median 13% — pricing power intact or improving.
- Worst year 2015 · −48.3% op. margin
What this means
Operations went underwater in 2015, understand why before trusting the good years.
- Share count +0.0%/yr
What this means
Roughly flat share count, little dilution, little buyback.
Does AI threaten the moat?
Elevated contestabilityThe 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.
Despite the structural exposure, the latest 10-K does not name AI as a competitive risk, which is itself worth a question.
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, Dec 31, 2024Can 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.
- Cash & short-term investments₩251.4B
- Receivables₩81.2B
- Other current assets₩321.1B
- Accounts payable₩10.0B
- Other current liabilities₩98.6B
From the company's latest filing.
How the cash was used, 2015–2024
Over the record, the business generated ₩538.3B of operating cash; how management split it reads as a cash builder, a large share of cash simply built up on the balance sheet.
- Reinvested₩10.2B · 2%
- Retained (debt / cash)₩528.1B · 98%
- Source of fundingOperating cash
Operating cash covered reinvestment and returns; over the span cash and short-term investments rose ₩215.0B.
- Net change in share count0.0%
The diluted count barely moved (7M to 7M): buybacks roughly offset the stock issued to staff.
- Dividend record—
No dividend line was reported in the filing data over the span; the record here neither confirms nor rules out a payout.
- Return on what it retained19%
Of the earnings it kept rather than paid out (₩497.0B over the span), annual owner earnings (first three years vs last three) grew ₩94.6B, so each retained ₩1 added about 0.19 of yearly owner earnings. Buffett's test, run on owner earnings instead of market value.
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.
Inverting the record
Invert: instead of why GRAVITY CO., LTD. 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 2015–2024.
None of the 4 tests turned up a mark; each came back clean. A clean panel says only that these particular ways of being wrong are not written into the record.
- Is it less profitable than it was?
- Did the share count rise anyway?
- 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.
Peers, IT Services & Consulting
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 |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| GRVYGRAVITY CO., LTD. | ₩500.8B | 36% | 15.3% | — | 16% |
| GOOGAlphabet Inc. Class C Capital Stock | $402.8B | 57% | 26.4% | 21% | 31% |
| MSFTMicrosoft Corp. | $281.7B | 68% | 39.3% | 28% | 36% |
| METAMeta Platforms Inc. | $201.0B | 82% | 40.5% | 25% | 45% |
| CRMSalesforce Inc. | $41.5B | 74% | 3.7% | 3% | 22% |
| XYZBlock Inc. | $24.2B | 34% | -0.7% | -1% | 4% |
| ADPAutomatic Data Processing Inc. | $20.6B | 43% | 21.3% | 46% | 19% |
| DXCDXC Technology Company Common Stock | $12.6B | — | 8.0% | 12% | 8% |
| Group median | — | 57% | 18.3% | — | 21% |
The price
What a price has to assume.
What the price implies
reverse-DCFEnter the US price, in dollars: the NYSE/Nasdaq quote you hold. Per the filing's own cover, “American depositary shares, each representing one share of common”; GRAVITY CO., LTD. reports in KRW, so every figure in this tool is stated per ADS and translated at KRW 1 = $0.0007 (2026-07-17, reference rate) so your dollar quote reconciles exactly. The record tables elsewhere on this page remain as filed, in KRW.
Type today's close and see the owner-earnings growth you'd have to believe to justify it, beside what GRAVITY CO., LTD. has delivered.
Through the cycle, GRAVITY CO., LTD. earns about $55M on its 16.3% median owner-earnings margin. This year’s 15.6% margin runs in line with that. Normalize, below, values the price on that through-cycle figure rather than the latest year.
—
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.
A dated snapshot of the price you typed, the assumptions you set, and what the page showed for them. A snapshot is never edited after it is saved. Your notebook is yours alone — the commitment states what is stored and what we will never do.
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.
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 $53M on 7M shares outstanding, per the 20-F cover, as of 2025-12-31; net cash $170M. 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.
Manual order: ← GRRR its page in the Manual GSIW →
Industry order: ← GMHS the IT Services & Consulting chapter HNGE →