Owner Scorecard


← All companies ← IPHA Manual IRS → ← IMAX Entertainment & Studios LION →

IQ, iQIYI Inc.

Entertainment & Studios diversified Unprofitable

Revenue is led by Membership (62%) and Advertising (19%), with 2 more lines behind.

Latest annual: FY2025 20-F · figures as filed, in CNY · 1 ADS = 7 ordinary shares
IQ · iQIYI Inc.
I

The business

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

Revenue · FY2025
CN¥27.3B
−6.6% YoY · −2% 5-yr CAGR
Vital signs · TTM, with 5-yr average
Revenue CN¥27.3B 5-yr avg CN¥29.6B
Gross margin 21% 5-yr avg 21%
Operating margin 0.8% 5-yr avg 1.3%
Owner-earnings margin 0% 5-yr avg −1%
Free cash flow margin 0% 5-yr avg −1%

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
A diversified business; where the profit really comes from, and whether it is earned or bought, is what the segment detail settles.
Situation
Unprofitable. No sustained operating profit across the record; an earnings multiple has nothing to rest on. What the record does show is revenue, the gross-margin trajectory, and the burn against the cash on hand.
What moves the needle
Operating margin has run around −20% through the cycle on a 6.1% gross margin, the operating line deeply negative — so the lever is the path to a margin at all: revenue growth against the cost curve and the cash runway, not the level of a margin that isn't there yet. The cash cycle has run negative through the cycle (a median of −101 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 customer concentration, 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 →

Membership is 62% of revenue, with Advertising the other meaningful line at 19%.

Revenue by product line, FY2025
  • Membership62%CN¥16.8B
  • Advertising19%CN¥5.2B
  • Others10%CN¥2.8B
  • Content distribution9%CN¥2.5B

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.

II

The record

Ten years of arithmetic, read across the cycle.

The record, 2016–2025

realized figures from each filing · older years to the left
2016’162017’172018’182019’192020’202021’212022’222023’232024’242025’25TTMTTMDec 2025
Income statement
CN¥11.2BCN¥17.4BCN¥25.0BCN¥29.0BCN¥29.7BCN¥30.6BCN¥29.0BCN¥31.9BCN¥29.2BCN¥27.3BCN¥27.3BRevenueRevenue
−2%−0%−9%−5%6%10%23%28%25%21%21%Gross marginGross mgn
(CN¥2.8B)(CN¥4.0B)(CN¥8.3B)(CN¥9.3B)(CN¥6.0B)(CN¥4.5B)CN¥1.3BCN¥3.0BCN¥1.8BCN¥229MCN¥229MOperating incomeOp. inc.
−24.8%−22.7%−33.2%−31.9%−20.3%−14.7%4.5%9.4%6.2%0.8%0.8%Operating marginOp. mgn
(CN¥3.1B)(CN¥3.7B)(CN¥9.1B)(CN¥10.3B)(CN¥7.0B)(CN¥6.1B)(CN¥118M)CN¥2.0BCN¥791M(CN¥204M)(CN¥204M)Net incomeNet inc.
Cash flow & returns
CN¥2.6BCN¥4.0BCN¥2.9BCN¥3.9B(CN¥5.4B)(CN¥6.0B)(CN¥71M)CN¥3.4BCN¥2.1BCN¥106MCN¥106MOperating cash flowOp. cash
CN¥306MCN¥349MCN¥312MCN¥476MCN¥480MCN¥400MCN¥337MCN¥275MCN¥148MCN¥138MCN¥138MDepreciationDeprec.
CN¥5.4BCN¥7.4BCN¥11.6BCN¥13.7BCN¥1.1B(CN¥244M)(CN¥290M)CN¥1.1BCN¥1.2BCN¥172MCN¥172MWorking capital & otherWC & other
CN¥400MCN¥1.0BCN¥612MCN¥740MCN¥241MCN¥262MCN¥174MCN¥37MCN¥79MCN¥96MCN¥96MCapexCapex
3.6%5.9%2.4%2.6%0.8%0.9%0.6%0.1%0.3%0.4%0.4%Capex / revenueCapex/rev
CN¥2.3BCN¥3.7BCN¥2.6BCN¥3.4B(CN¥5.7B)(CN¥6.2B)(CN¥245M)CN¥3.3BCN¥2.0BCN¥10MCN¥10MOwner earningsOwner earn.
20.5%21.1%10.3%11.8%−19.0%−20.3%−0.8%10.4%6.9%0.0%0.0%Owner earnings marginOE mgn
CN¥2.2BCN¥3.0BCN¥2.3BCN¥3.2B(CN¥5.7B)(CN¥6.2B)(CN¥245M)CN¥3.3BCN¥2.0BCN¥10MCN¥10MFree cash flowFCF
19.7%17.2%9.1%10.9%−19.0%−20.3%−0.8%10.4%6.9%0.0%0.0%Free cash flow marginFCF mgn
Balance sheet
CN¥1.5BCN¥10.6BCN¥10.5BCN¥14.3BCN¥4.3BCN¥7.9BCN¥5.4BCN¥4.5BCN¥4.7BCN¥4.7BCash & investmentsCash+inv
CN¥2.2BCN¥2.9BCN¥3.6BCN¥3.3BCN¥2.7BCN¥2.4BCN¥2.2BCN¥2.2BCN¥2.5BCN¥2.5BReceivablesReceiv.
CN¥7.0BCN¥10.2BCN¥10.2BAccounts payablePayables
(CN¥4.8B)(CN¥7.3B)CN¥3.6BCN¥3.3BCN¥2.7BCN¥2.4BCN¥2.2BCN¥2.2BCN¥2.5B(CN¥7.6B)Operating working capitalOper. WC
CN¥5.7BCN¥19.9BCN¥20.3BCN¥22.3BCN¥11.5BCN¥13.8BCN¥12.6BCN¥9.5BCN¥10.3BCN¥10.3BCurrent assetsCur. assets
CN¥11.6BCN¥19.8BCN¥20.2BCN¥24.9BCN¥22.5BCN¥28.1BCN¥22.3BCN¥21.5BCN¥22.1BCN¥22.1BCurrent liabilitiesCur. liab.
0.5×1.0×1.0×0.9×0.5×0.5×0.6×0.4×0.5×0.5×Current ratioCurr. ratio
CN¥3.3BCN¥589MCN¥3.9BCN¥3.9BCN¥3.9BCN¥3.8BCN¥3.8BCN¥3.8BCN¥3.8BCN¥3.8BGoodwillGoodwill
CN¥20.2BCN¥44.8BCN¥44.8BCN¥48.2BCN¥42.5BCN¥46.0BCN¥44.6BCN¥45.8BCN¥46.7BCN¥46.7BTotal assetsAssets
-25.2×-14.2×-87.7×-10.1×-5.7×-3.3×1.8×2.6×1.7×0.3×0.2×Interest coverageInt. cov.
Per share
3.43B3.24B343MShares out (diluted)Shares
CN¥3.28CN¥5.36CN¥79.67Revenue / shareRev/sh
CN¥-0.90CN¥-1.15CN¥-0.60EPS (diluted)EPS
CN¥0.67CN¥1.13CN¥0.03Owner earnings / shareOE/sh
CN¥0.65CN¥0.92CN¥0.03Free cash flow / shareFCF/sh
CN¥0.12CN¥0.32CN¥0.28Cap. spending / shareCapex/sh

Share counts before 2017 are restated ×10 for a stock split, so per-share figures sit on one basis.

The diluted share count moved ×1/9.47 into TTM — shares retired, not a split the totals corroborate — and the per-share figures carry the counts as filed.

Per-share growththe realized rate an owner's share compounded
9-yr5-yr
Revenue / share+63.3%/yr (1-yr)+63.3%/yr (1-yr)
Owner earnings / share+67.8%/yr (1-yr)+67.8%/yr (1-yr)
Capital spending / share+170.0%/yr (1-yr)+170.0%/yr (1-yr)

The record, charted

FY2016–2025

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

Gross margin
21%low FY2018

Owner earnings vs. net income

Owner earningsNet income

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

CN¥10Mowner earningsvs.(CN¥204M)net incomelow FY2021

Where the cash went

ReinvestBuybacksDividendsAcquisitionsRetained

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

FY2016FY2025

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 a CN¥204M loss into CN¥10M of owner earnings: more cash than the profit line showed, after the non-cash charges and the capital it put back in.

FY2025FY2024FY2023FY2022FY2021
Reported net income(CN¥204M)CN¥791MCN¥2.0B(CN¥118M)(CN¥6.1B)
Depreciation & amortizationnon-cash charge added back+CN¥138M+CN¥148M+CN¥275M+CN¥337M+CN¥400M
Working capital & othertiming of cash in and out, other non-cash items+CN¥172M+CN¥1.2B+CN¥1.1B−CN¥290M−CN¥244M
Cash from operationsCN¥106MCN¥2.1BCN¥3.4B(CN¥71M)(CN¥6.0B)
Capital expenditurecash put back in to keep running and to grow−CN¥96M−CN¥79M−CN¥37M−CN¥174M−CN¥262M
Owner earningsCN¥10MCN¥2.0BCN¥3.3B(CN¥245M)(CN¥6.2B)
Owner-earnings marginowner earnings ÷ revenue0%7%10%-1%-20%

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.

III

Quality & stewardship

Returns, the balance sheet, capital allocation, and pay.

Owner’s Scorecard

FY2025 20-F · source on SEC EDGAR →

Will it survive?

  • Does not cover its interest
    Operating income CN¥229M ÷ interest expense CN¥1.1B
    What this means

    A full year of operating profit didn't cover the interest bill. This is the zombie zone: the business depends on refinancing, asset sales, or forbearance to service its debt.

  • 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.

  • Negative, funded by others
    DSO 34 + DIO 0 − DPO 172 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?

  • Debt under-captured
    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.

  • Solid through the cycle
    10-yr median margin, range -20%–21%; latest CN¥10M = operating cash CN¥106M − maintenance capex CN¥96M
    Industry peers: median 3%
    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 0% of revenue this year, a 7% median across 10 years.

  • Loss, but cash-generative
    Net income (CN¥204M) · cash from operations CN¥106M
    What this means

    The company reported a net loss, so a conversion ratio isn't meaningful. What matters then is whether operations still threw off cash, here, they did.

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? 0.69×
    Harvesting
    Capex CN¥96M ÷ depreciation CN¥138M
    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 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) · CN¥27.3B
    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 Miss
    Current ratio ≥ 2× · 0.47×
    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 Miss
    A profit every year (10-yr record) · 8 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 · 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 CN¥0.13/share (latest year CN¥-0.03), the averaged base the calculator's gate runs on. 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 2 of 10
    What this means

    Lost money in 8 year(s), look at what happened there before trusting the average.

  • Operating margin −27% → 5% (3-yr avg ends)
    What this means

    Through the cycle the operating margin widened — about −27% early to 5% lately, median −20% — pricing power intact or improving.

  • Owner earnings growth −11%/yr
    What this means

    Owner earnings shrank about 11% a year over the record.

  • Worst year 2018 · −33.2% op. margin
    What this means

    Operations went underwater in 2018, understand why before trusting the good years.

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.

In its own filing Raised, but not as a competitor

The filing raises AI among its risks, but in other terms (security, regulation, energy or the like), not as a competitor to its product; it frames AI mainly as a capability.

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 fiscal year-end, Dec 31, 2025

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 assetsCN¥10.3B
  • Cash & short-term investmentsCN¥4.7B
  • ReceivablesCN¥2.5B
  • Other current assetsCN¥3.1B
Current liabilitiesCN¥22.1B
  • Debt due within a yearCN¥738M
  • Accounts payableCN¥10.2B
  • Other current liabilitiesCN¥11.2B
Current ratio0.47×all current assets ÷ what's due · Graham looked for 2×
Quick ratio0.47×stricter: inventory excluded
Cash ratio0.21×strictest: cash alone against what's due
Working capital(CN¥11.8B)the cushion left after near-term bills
Debt due this year vs. cashCN¥738M due · CN¥4.7B cash covered by cash on hand, no refinancing forced · both figures from the Dec 31, 2025 balance sheet
Deeper floors
Net current asset value(CN¥23.1B)Graham's net-net: current assets less all liabilities
Debt incl. operating leasesCN¥1.4BCN¥84M of it operating leases
Deferred revenueCN¥4.2Bcustomer 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 CN¥7.5B of operating cash; how management split it reads as a balanced allocator, splitting cash between the business, owners, and the balance sheet.

  • ReinvestedCN¥3.7B · 49%
  • Retained (debt / cash)CN¥3.9B · 51%
  • Net change in share count−90.0%

    The diluted count fell from 3425M to 343M, so the buybacks outran 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.

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.

Peers, Entertainment & Studios

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.

CompanyRevenueGross marginOp. marginROICOwner earn. margin
NFLXNetflix Inc.$45.2B39%18.1%18%3%
IQiQIYI Inc.CN¥27.3B8%-17.5%9%
LIONLionsgate Studios Corp$2.6B1.5%6%
STRZStarz Entertainment Corp.$1.4B0.1%-5%-1%
Group median0.8%4%
IV

The price

What a price has to assume.

What the price implies

reverse-DCF

Enter the US price, in dollars: the NYSE/Nasdaq quote you hold. Per the filing's own cover, “American Depositary Shares ( each representing seven Class”; iQIYI Inc. reports in CNY, so every figure in this tool is stated per ADS and translated at CNY 1 = $0.147 (2026-07-17, reference rate) so your dollar quote reconciles exactly. The record tables elsewhere on this page remain as filed, in CNY.

Type today's close and see the owner-earnings growth you'd have to believe to justify it, beside what iQIYI Inc. has delivered.

$

Through the cycle, iQIYI Inc. earns about $347M on its 8.6% median owner-earnings margin. This year’s 0.0% margin runs below that; the reported figure may understate a lean year. Normalize, below, values the price on that through-cycle figure rather than the latest year.

Base

The assumptions

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 · ’16→’25−10%/yr
Owner-earnings yield
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 $1M on 965M shares outstanding (a weighted cover-text, the only count this filer tags); net cash $501M. 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.

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

Manual order: ← IPHA its page in the Manual IRS →

Industry order: ← IMAX the Entertainment & Studios chapter LION →