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HPK, HighPeak Energy Inc.

Oilfield Services & Equipment capital-intensive Cyclical

An oil and gas business, whose fortunes rise and fall with a price it does not set.

Latest annual: FY2025 10-K

HPK · HighPeak Energy Inc.

The business

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

Revenue · FY2025

$863M

−22.7% YoY · 154% 5-yr CAGR

Vital signs · TTM, with 5-yr average

Revenue $807M 5-yr avg $817M

Operating margin 11.8% 5-yr avg 37.5%

Owner-earnings margin 50% 5-yr avg 58%

Free cash flow margin 50% 5-yr avg 58%

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.
What moves the needle: Operating margin has run about 30% through the cycle, a wide margin for the work it does — whether that reflects a durable edge or one that can fade is what the record weighs. The margin is cyclical, swinging between −143% and 56% 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. Read this kind of business on the commodity price, and the cost to lift a barrel. 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 13%). By owner earnings: roughly 59% of revenue reaches owners as cash, consistently. 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.

The record

Ten years of arithmetic, read across the cycle.

The record, 2019–2025

realized figures from each filing · older years to the left

2019’19	2021’21	2022’22	2023’23	2024’24	2025’25	TTMTTMMar 2026
							Income statement
$8M	$220M	$756M	$1.1B	$1.1B	$863M	$807M	RevenueRevenue
107%	4%	2%	1%	2%	3%	3%	SG&A / revenueSG&A/rev
($12M)	$102M	$423M	$426M	$337M	$150M	$96M	Operating incomeOp. inc.
−142.7%	46.2%	55.9%	37.7%	30.2%	17.4%	11.8%	Operating marginOp. mgn
($12M)	$56M	$237M	$216M	$95M	$19M	($145M)	Net incomeNet inc.
—	23%	24%	23%	27%	28%	—	Effective tax rateTax rate
							Cash flow & returns
($772K)	$147M	$504M	$756M	$690M	$512M	$409M	Operating cash flowOp. cash
$4M	$65M	$178M	$424M	$501M	$422M	$425M	DepreciationDeprec.
$7M	$20M	$56M	$90M	$82M	$70M	$127M	Working capital & otherWC & other
$11M	$54M	$23M	$15M	$15M	$7M	$4M	CapexCapex
134.5%	24.5%	3.0%	1.3%	1.3%	0.8%	0.5%	Capex / revenueCapex/rev
($5M)	$93M	$481M	$741M	$676M	$505M	$404M	Owner earningsOwner earn.
−62.1%	42.3%	63.7%	65.5%	60.5%	58.5%	50.1%	Owner earnings marginOE mgn
($12M)	$93M	$481M	$741M	$676M	$505M	$404M	Free cash flowFCF
−144.1%	42.3%	63.7%	65.5%	60.5%	58.5%	50.1%	Free cash flow marginFCF mgn
—	$12M	$10M	$12M	$20M	$21M	$16M	Dividends paidDiv. paid
—	—	$0	$0	$35M	$0	—	BuybacksBuybacks
—	13%	17%	13%	10%	4%	—	ROICROIC
—	10%	20%	14%	6%	1%	-10%	Return on equityROE
—	8%	19%	13%	5%	−0%	−11%	Retained to equityRetained/eq
							Balance sheet
$23M	$35M	$31M	$195M	$87M	$162M	$96M	Cash & investmentsCash+inv
$3M	$39M	$97M	$95M	$85M	$56M	$99M	ReceivablesReceiv.
$184K	$3M	$13M	$7M	$11M	$8M	$4M	InventoryInvent.
$11M	$38M	$106M	$64M	$74M	$84M	$51M	Accounts payablePayables
($8M)	$5M	$4M	$38M	$22M	($21M)	$52M	Operating working capitalOper. WC
$92M	$87M	$145M	$329M	$195M	$260M	$212M	Current assetsCur. assets
$31M	$103M	$266M	$287M	$285M	$230M	$317M	Current liabilitiesCur. liab.
3.0×	0.8×	0.5×	1.1×	0.7×	1.1×	0.7×	Current ratioCurr. ratio
$498M	$819M	$2.3B	$3.1B	$3.1B	$3.2B	$3.1B	Total assetsAssets
—	$98M	$704M	$1.2B	$1.0B	$1.2B	$1.2B	Total debtDebt
—	$63M	$674M	$956M	$962M	$1.0B	$1.1B	Net debt / (cash)Net debt
—	40.9×	8.3×	2.9×	2.0×	1.0×	0.7×	Interest coverageInt. cov.
—	$553M	$1.2B	$1.6B	$1.6B	$1.6B	$1.5B	Shareholders’ equityEquity
—	3.0%	4.4%	2.3%	1.1%	0.1%	0.2%	Stock comp / revenueSBC/rev
							Per share
—	94.8M	111M	123M	129M	125M	125M	Shares out (diluted)Shares
—	$2.32	$6.80	$9.19	$8.65	$6.89	$6.44	Revenue / shareRev/sh
—	$0.59	$2.13	$1.75	$0.74	$0.15	$-1.16	EPS (diluted)EPS
—	$0.98	$4.33	$6.03	$5.23	$4.03	$3.23	Owner earnings / shareOE/sh
—	$0.98	$4.33	$6.03	$5.23	$4.03	$3.23	Free cash flow / shareFCF/sh
—	$0.12	$0.09	$0.10	$0.16	$0.17	$0.13	Dividends / shareDiv/sh
—	$0.57	$0.21	$0.12	$0.11	$0.05	$0.03	Cap. spending / shareCapex/sh
—	$5.84	$10.52	$12.62	$12.40	$12.72	$11.72	Book value / shareBVPS

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

	6-yr	5-yr
Revenue / share	+31.2%/yr (4-yr)	+31.2%/yr (4-yr)
Owner earnings / share	+42.3%/yr (4-yr)	+42.3%/yr (4-yr)
EPS	−28.7%/yr (4-yr)	−28.7%/yr (4-yr)
Dividends / share	+8.1%/yr (4-yr)	+8.1%/yr (4-yr)
Capital spending / share	−44.7%/yr (4-yr)	−44.7%/yr (4-yr)
Book value / share	+21.5%/yr (4-yr)	+21.5%/yr (4-yr)

The record, charted

FY2019–2025

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

Share count

125Mpeak FY2024

ROIC

4%low FY2025

Net debt ÷ owner earnings

2.0×peak FY2025

Owner earnings vs. net income

Owner earningsNet income

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

$505Mowner earningsvs.$19Mnet incomelow FY2019

Where the cash went

ReinvestBuybacksDividendsAcquisitionsRetained

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

FY2021FY2025

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 $19M of profit into $505M 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$19M

Owner earnings$505M · 58% of revenue

	FY2025	FY2024	FY2023	FY2022	FY2021
Reported net income	$19M	$95M	$216M	$237M	$56M
Depreciation & amortizationnon-cash charge added back	+$422M	+$501M	+$424M	+$178M	+$65M
Stock-based compensationreal costnon-cash, but a real cost	+$619K	+$13M	+$26M	+$33M	+$7M
Working capital & othertiming of cash in and out, other non-cash items	+$70M	+$82M	+$90M	+$56M	+$20M
Cash from operations	$512M	$690M	$756M	$504M	$147M
Capital expenditurecash put back in to keep running and to grow	−$7M	−$15M	−$15M	−$23M	−$54M
Owner earnings	$505M	$676M	$741M	$481M	$93M
Owner-earnings marginowner earnings ÷ revenue	58%	60%	66%	64%	42%

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 $619K), owner earnings is nearer $504M.

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? 1.0×

Thin

Operating income $150M ÷ interest expense $147M

What this means
Operating profit covers interest, but with little room. A bad year, a refinancing at higher rates, or a revenue wobble closes the gap fast.
How heavy is the debt, net of cash? $1.0B · 6.9× operating profit

Heavy net debt

Cash $162M − debt $1.2B

What this means
Netting $162M of cash and short-term investments against $1.2B of debt leaves $1.0B owed, about 6.9× a year's operating profit (8.0× 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? —

Not enough data

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

Is it a good business?

Return on invested capital 13%

Solid through the cycle

5-yr median, range 4%–17%; 4% latest = NOPAT $109M ÷ invested capital $2.6B

Industry peers: median 1%

What this means
The rate the business earns on the money tied up in it, Buffett's north star, because over time a stock tracks the ROIC beneath it. Above ~15% sustained hints at a moat; a return below the cost of capital (~8%) erodes value as a business grows rather than building it — the test Buffett weighs most. The headline is the median of the last 5 years (it ran 4% 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 58%

High through the cycle

6-yr median margin, range -62%–66%; latest $505M = operating cash $512M − maintenance capex $7M

Industry peers: median 6%

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 58% of revenue this year, a 58% median across 6 years. Treating stock comp as the real expense it is (less $619K of SBC) leaves $504M.
Are earnings backed by cash? 26.98×

Cash-backed

Cash from ops $512M ÷ net income $19M

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? 4%

Reinvests most of it

Dividends + buybacks $21M ÷ Owner Earnings $505M

What this means
Of $505M Owner Earnings, $21M (4%) went back to shareholders, $21M dividends, $0 buybacks. 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? 0.02×

Harvesting

Capex $7M ÷ depreciation $422M

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 · 0 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 Miss

Revenue ≥ $2B · $863M

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

Current ratio ≥ 2× · 1.13×

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 · $1.2B vs $30M 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 (6-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 Miss

Uninterrupted dividends · 5 of 6 yrs

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

Earnings +33% over the record · +17%

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 $0.87/share (latest year $0.15), the averaged base the calculator's gate runs on, and book value is $12.62/share. Enter a price in “What the price implies” just below for the P/E, P/B, and whether it clears. But this is the rule Buffett outgrew: there's no hard P/E law, and a wonderful business can deserve a far richer multiple if the thesis holds, treat it as the bargain-hunter's floor, not a verdict on the price.

Durability & moat, 2019–2025

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

Profitable years 5 of 6

What this means
Lost money in 1 year(s), look at what happened there before trusting the average.
Return on capital ≥ 15% 1 of 5 yrs

What this means
A moat shows up as a high return on invested capital that holds year after year, not one good vintage.
Operating margin −14% → 28% (3-yr avg ends)

What this means
Through the cycle the operating margin widened — about −14% early to 28% lately, median 30% — pricing power intact or improving.
Reinvestment, incremental ROIC 11%

What this means
Reinvested capital came back at only a modest incremental return — near the cost of capital, where extra growth adds little per dollar. The record shows whether it is a soft stretch or a thinning moat.
Owner earnings growth +54%/yr

What this means
Owner earnings grew about 54% a year over the record.
Worst year 2019 · −142.7% op. margin

What this means
Operations went underwater in 2019, understand why before trusting the good years.
Share count +4.8%/yr

What this means
The share count is rising, dilution works against you on a per-share basis.
Dividend record rising

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

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.

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.

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$212M

Cash & short-term investments$96M
Receivables$99M
Inventory$4M
Other current assets$13M

Current liabilities$317M

Debt due within a year$90M
Accounts payable$51M
Other current liabilities$176M

Current ratio0.67×all current assets ÷ what's due · Graham looked for 2×

Quick ratio0.66×stricter: inventory excluded

Cash ratio0.30×strictest: cash alone against what's due

Working capital($105M)the cushion left after near-term bills

Debt due this year vs. cash$90M due · $96M 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−20.7%the freshest read on whether the business is still growing

Current ratio, recent quarters0.9× → 0.7×

Deeper floors

Tangible book value$1.5Bequity stripped of goodwill & intangibles

Debt incl. operating leases$1.2B$757K of it operating leases

From the company's latest filing.

How the cash was used, 2019–2025

Over the record, the business generated $2.6B of operating cash; how management split it reads as a balanced allocator, splitting cash between the business, owners, and the balance sheet.

Reinvested$125M · 5%
Dividends$75M · 3%
Buybacks$35M · 1%
Retained (debt / cash)$2.4B · 91%

Returned to owners$110M
4% of the owner earnings the business produced over the span, $75M as dividends and $35M as buybacks.
Average price paid for buybacks—
Buybacks ran $35M over the span, but the filings don't tag the share count needed to deduce the average price paid.
Net change in share count32.2%
The diluted count rose from 95M to 125M: issuance (stock pay, deals) outran any buybacks, so owners were diluted on net.
Dividend record$0.17/sh
Paid in 5 of the years on record, the per-share dividend growing about 8% a year. It was cut at least once along the way.
Return on what it retained90%
Of the earnings it kept rather than paid out ($501M over the span), annual owner earnings (first three years vs last three) grew $451M, so each retained $1 added about 0.90 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.

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	Pay, as filed	“Actually paid”	Owner earnings
2023	$9.0M	−$8.2M	$741M
2023	$9.0M	−$8.2M	$741M
2024	$5.3M	$5.9M	$676M
2024	$5.3M	$5.9M	$676M
2025	$9.4M	−$4.4M	$505M
2025	$2.8M	$1.7M	$505M

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 ownership5.6%
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$619K
The slice of the business handed to employees in shares this year, 0% of revenue, equal to 0% 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 HighPeak Energy Inc. is a good business, the question is what would make owning it a mistake, and whether those marks are in the record. Disconfirming tests across 2019–2025.

1 of the 4 tests turned up something to look into; the other 3 came back clean.

Look hereDid the share count rise anyway?32.2%
Diluted shares grew 32.2% over 2019–2025, even as the company spent $35M on buybacks. The repurchases were outrun by issuance — to staff, in a raise, or in a deal — and the filing says which; owners' slice still shrank. Read the buyback line beside this one, not on its own.

And these came back clean

Is it less profitable than it was?
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, FY2025

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, Oilfield Services & Equipment

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
XPROExpro Group Holdings N.V.	$1.6B	95%	-12.2%	-8%	-1%
NESRNational Energy Services Reunited Corp	$1.3B	13%	7.4%	8%	9%
HLXHelix Energy Solutions Group Inc.	$1.3B	12%	3.3%	1%	9%
PUMPProPetro Holding Corp.	$1.3B	—	0.1%	0%	7%
SDRLSeadrill Limited	$1.1B	—	28.5%	—	-7%
HPKHighPeak Energy Inc.	$863M	—	34.0%	13%	59%
RNGRRanger Energy Services Inc.	$547M	—	1.1%	1%	6%
CLBCore Laboratories Inc.	$527M	20%	10.7%	11%	5%
Group median	—	—	5.4%	1%	7%

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 HighPeak Energy Inc. has delivered.

Today’s price $

Through the cycle, HighPeak Energy Inc. earns about $513M on its 59.5% median owner-earnings margin. This year’s 58.5% 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 ($513M) Net of stock comp (−$1M)

—

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+20%/yr

Owner-earnings growth · ’19→’25+56%/yr

Owner-earnings yield—

P/E (3-yr earnings ’23–’25)—

P/B—

Graham’s price gate—

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

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

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

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

Owner earnings $404M on 126M shares outstanding, per the 10-Q cover, as of 2026-04-30; net debt $1.1B. 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. The dials set the multiple a growth belief justifies; the price, and every dollar on this page, is yours.

Weigh HPK against another business →

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

Manual order: ← HPE its page in the Manual HPP →

Industry order: ← HP the Oilfield Services & Equipment chapter INVX →