← All companies ← MPWR Manual MRAM → ← MOMO Software MSFT →

MQ, Marqeta Inc.

Software asset-light

Marqeta's open APIs provide instant access to a highly scalable, cloud-based payment infrastructure that enables customers to embed the payments experience into apps or websites for a personalized user experience.

Marqeta's mission is modernizing financial services by making the entire payment experience native and delightful.

Marqeta's modern platform empowers our customers to create customized and innovative payment card programs, giving them configurability and flexibility.

Latest annual: FY2025 10-K

MQ · Marqeta Inc.

The business

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

Revenue · FY2025

$625M

+23.3% YoY · 17% 5-yr CAGR

Vital signs · TTM, with 5-yr average

Revenue $652M 5-yr avg $615M

Gross margin 70% 5-yr avg 55%

Operating margin −4.0% 5-yr avg −22.7%

ROIC −30% 5-yr avg −53%

Owner-earnings margin 23% 5-yr avg 10%

Free cash flow margin 23% 5-yr avg 10%

The business in brief

read the 10-K →

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

What moves the needle: Operating margin has run around −28% through the cycle on a 45% gross margin, the operating line in the red even at its best — so the lever is whether the spending below the gross line can come down enough to clear a profit: revenue growth against the cost curve, and the cash runway until it does. Stock-based pay runs about 17% of sales, a real and recurring claim on owners that the GAAP margin understates. Read this kind of business on retention and the cost of growth. On its own account, the filing leans hardest on customer concentration, set against the numbers in what the filing emphasizes, below.
Is it a good business?: Return on capital has rarely cleared the cost of capital (median −57%, above 15% in 0 of 5 years). The steadier read is owner earnings: roughly 10% of revenue reaches owners as cash, though it swings. This is price-taker territory, where the balance sheet and the cycle matter more than any multiple; the rest is in the 10-K.

Every line is arithmetic on the company's filings, shown in full in the sections below.

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	2020’20	2021’21	2022’22	2023’23	2024’24	2025’25	TTMTTMMar 2026
								Income statement
$143M	$290M	$517M	$748M	$676M	$507M	$625M	$652M	RevenueRevenue
42%	41%	45%	43%	49%	69%	70%	70%	Gross marginGross mgn
($59M)	($47M)	($162M)	($210M)	($283M)	($24M)	($46M)	($26M)	Operating incomeOp. inc.
−41.1%	−16.2%	−31.3%	−28.0%	−41.9%	−4.8%	−7.4%	−4.0%	Operating marginOp. mgn
($58M)	($48M)	($164M)	($185M)	($223M)	$27M	($14M)	$2M	Net incomeNet inc.
								Cash flow & returns
($15M)	$50M	$57M	($13M)	$21M	$58M	$163M	$149M	Operating cash flowOp. cash
$3M	$3M	$4M	$4M	$11M	$17M	$27M	$31M	DepreciationDeprec.
$18M	$66M	$75M	$60M	$106M	($123M)	$45M	$18M	Working capital & otherWC & other
$5M	$2M	$3M	$2M	$762K	$2M	$2M	$2M	CapexCapex
3.4%	0.8%	0.5%	0.3%	0.1%	0.5%	0.3%	0.3%	Capex / revenueCapex/rev
($19M)	$48M	$54M	($15M)	$20M	$56M	$161M	$147M	Owner earningsOwner earn.
−12.9%	16.5%	10.5%	−2.0%	3.0%	11.0%	25.7%	22.6%	Owner earnings marginOE mgn
($20M)	$48M	$54M	($15M)	$20M	$56M	$161M	$147M	Free cash flowFCF
−14.2%	16.5%	10.5%	−2.0%	3.0%	11.0%	25.7%	22.6%	Free cash flow marginFCF mgn
—	—	$0	$0	$136M	$0	$46M	$46M	AcquisitionsAcquis.
—	$0	$0	$78M	$190M	$154M	$391M	—	BuybacksBuybacks
—	—	-39%	-57%	-85%	-15%	-70%	-30%	ROICROIC
—	—	-10%	-13%	-18%	3%	-2%	0%	Return on equityROE
—	—	−10%	−13%	−18%	3%	−2%	0%	Retained to equityRetained/eq
								Balance sheet
$60M	$220M	$1.2B	$1.2B	$981M	$923M	$709M	$675M	Cash & investmentsCash+inv
—	$8M	$13M	$16M	$20M	$30M	$41M	$46M	ReceivablesReceiv.
—	$8M	$13M	$16M	$20M	$30M	$41M	$46M	Operating working capitalOper. WC
—	$431M	$1.8B	$1.7B	$1.4B	$1.2B	$1.2B	$1.2B	Current assetsCur. assets
—	$141M	$238M	$283M	$337M	$371M	$749M	$721M	Current liabilitiesCur. liab.
—	3.1×	7.6×	6.2×	4.1×	3.4×	1.6×	1.6×	Current ratioCurr. ratio
—	—	—	$0	$124M	$124M	$155M	$154M	GoodwillGoodwill
—	$458M	$1.8B	$1.8B	$1.6B	$1.5B	$1.5B	$1.5B	Total assetsAssets
($60M)	($220M)	($1.2B)	($1.2B)	($981M)	($923M)	($709M)	($675M)	Net debt / (cash)Net debt
($198M)	($214M)	$1.6B	$1.5B	$1.2B	$1.1B	$762M	$742M	Shareholders’ equityEquity
15.2%	9.7%	27.6%	14.4%	18.9%	26.9%	16.8%	15.2%	Stock comp / revenueSBC/rev
								Per share
114M	123M	363M	545M	533M	519M	462M	434M	Shares out (diluted)Shares
$1.26	$2.36	$1.43	$1.37	$1.27	$0.98	$1.35	$1.50	Revenue / shareRev/sh
$-0.51	$-0.39	$-0.45	$-0.34	$-0.42	$0.05	$-0.03	$0.01	EPS (diluted)EPS
$-0.16	$0.39	$0.15	$-0.03	$0.04	$0.11	$0.35	$0.34	Owner earnings / shareOE/sh
$-0.18	$0.39	$0.15	$-0.03	$0.04	$0.11	$0.35	$0.34	Free cash flow / shareFCF/sh
$0.04	$0.02	$0.01	$0.00	$0.00	$0.00	$0.00	$0.00	Cap. spending / shareCapex/sh
$-1.74	$-1.74	$4.34	$2.70	$2.33	$2.09	$1.65	$1.71	Book value / shareBVPS

The diluted share count moved ×2.95 into 2021 — shares issued, not a split the totals corroborate — and the per-share figures carry the counts as filed.

The diluted share count moved ×1.5 into 2022 — shares issued, 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

	6-yr	5-yr
Revenue / share	+1.2%/yr	−10.6%/yr
Owner earnings / share	—	−2.2%/yr
Capital spending / share	−32.8%/yr	−27.1%/yr

The record, charted

FY2019–2025

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

Share count

462Mpeak FY2022

ROIC

−70%low FY2023

Gross margin

70%low FY2020

Owner earnings vs. net income

Owner earningsNet income

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

$161Mowner earningsvs.($14M)net incomelow FY2019

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.

FY2020FY2025

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 a $14M loss into $161M of owner earnings: more cash than the profit line showed, after the non-cash charges and the capital it put back in.

	FY2025	FY2024	FY2023	FY2022	FY2021
Reported net income	($14M)	$27M	($223M)	($185M)	($164M)
Depreciation & amortizationnon-cash charge added back	+$27M	+$17M	+$11M	+$4M	+$4M
Stock-based compensationreal costnon-cash, but a real cost	+$105M	+$137M	+$128M	+$108M	+$143M
Working capital & othertiming of cash in and out, other non-cash items	+$45M	−$123M	+$106M	+$60M	+$75M
Cash from operations	$163M	$58M	$21M	($13M)	$57M
Capital expenditurecash put back in to keep running and to grow	−$2M	−$2M	−$762K	−$2M	−$3M
Owner earnings	$161M	$56M	$20M	($15M)	$54M
Owner-earnings marginowner earnings ÷ revenue	26%	11%	3%	-2%	10%

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 $105M), owner earnings is nearer $56M.

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? —

No meaningful interest burden

Little or no interest expense reported

What this means
Little or no interest expense reported, the business isn't leaning on lenders to operate.
How heavy is the debt, net of cash? +$709M

Net cash, debt-free

Cash $709M − debt $0

What this means
Cash and short-term investments exceed every dollar of debt by $709M, on net the company owes nothing, and can act from strength when others can't. 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 —

Not enough data

Industry peers: median -6%

What this means
The filing data didn't include the inputs for this check.
Owner-earnings margin 10%

Solid through the cycle

7-yr median margin, range -13%–26%; latest $161M = operating cash $163M − maintenance capex $2M

Industry peers: median 5%

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 26% of revenue this year, a 10% median across 7 years. Treating stock comp as the real expense it is (less $105M of SBC) leaves $56M.
Are earnings backed by cash? $163M

Loss, but cash-generative

Net income ($14M) · cash from operations $163M

In the filing’s words And the filing leans heavily on adjusted, non-GAAP earnings — steering you off the GAAP figure just where the cash is not backing it. Read the reconciliation in the notes before taking the adjusted number.

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?

Where do the earnings go? 243%

Returned more than it generated

Dividends + buybacks $391M ÷ Owner Earnings $161M

What this means
The company returned more than it generated: against $161M of Owner Earnings, $391M (243%) went back to shareholders, $0 dividends, $391M buybacks — the excess came from the balance sheet or borrowing, not the year's operations. Net of $105M stock comp, the real buyback was about $287M. Sustained, that pattern draws down cash or adds debt; the net-debt line above shows where it stands.
Investing or harvesting? 0.07×

Harvesting

Capex $2M ÷ depreciation $27M

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 4 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 · $625M

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 Near

Current ratio ≥ 2× · 1.65×

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.
Earnings stability Miss

A profit every year (7-yr record) · 6 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 $-0.16/share (latest year $-0.03), the averaged base the calculator's gate runs on, and book value is $1.78/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 1 of 7

What this means
Lost money in 6 year(s), look at what happened there before trusting the average.
Operating margin −30% → −18% (3-yr avg ends)

What this means
Through the cycle the operating margin widened — about −30% early to −18% lately, median −28% — pricing power intact or improving.
Owner earnings growth +39%/yr

What this means
Owner earnings grew about 39% a year over the record.
Worst year 2023 · −41.9% op. margin

What this means
Operations went underwater in 2023, understand why before trusting the good years.

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 Named as a competitive risk

Its FY2025 10-K names artificial intelligence as a competitive threat.

“Our competitors or other third parties may incorporate AI into their products, offerings, and solutions more quickly or more successfully than we do, which could impair our ability to compete effectively, and adversely affect our results of operations.”

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 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$1.2B

Cash & short-term investments$675M
Receivables$46M
Other current assets$468M

Current liabilities$721M

Other current liabilities$721M

Current ratio1.65×all current assets ÷ what's due · Graham looked for 2×

Quick ratio1.65×stricter: inventory excluded

Cash ratio0.94×strictest: cash alone against what's due

Working capital$467Mthe cushion left after near-term bills

Revenue, latest quarter vs. a year ago+19.2%the freshest read on whether the business is still growing

Current ratio, recent quarters3.8× → 1.6×

Deeper floors

Tangible book value$540Mequity stripped of goodwill & intangibles

Net current asset value$454MGraham's net-net: current assets less all liabilities

Debt incl. operating leases$7M$7M of it operating leases

Deferred revenue$11Mcustomer cash collected before delivery; operating float

From the company's latest filing.

How the cash was used, 2019–2025

Over the record, the business generated $321M of operating cash; how management split it reads as a cash returner, paying most of what it earns straight back to owners.

Reinvested$17M · 5%
Buybacks$814M · 254%

Returned to owners$814M
267% of the owner earnings the business produced over the span, $0 as dividends and $814M as buybacks.
Source of funding−$511M
Reinvestment and shareholder returns ran $511M beyond the operating cash the business generated, so the gap was financed off the balance sheet.
Average price paid for buybacks$6.68
Across the years where the filing reports a share count, 12M shares were bought for $78M, about $6.68 each.
Net change in share count280.8%
The diluted count rose from 114M to 434M: issuance (stock pay, deals) outran any buybacks, so owners were diluted on net.
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.

Management, ownership & pay

read the proxy →

From the proxy: how much of the business the people running it own, and how they are paid.

Stock-based compensation$105M
The slice of the business handed to employees in shares this year, 17% of revenue. 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.

What an owner would ask, FY2025

read the 10-K →

Which reported numbers are a judgment call?
Management names Revenue recognition, Income taxes, Acquisitions 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
NAVNNavan Inc.	$702M	68%	-28.0%	-21%	-10%
BLBlackLine	$700M	76%	-9.4%	-3%	11%
QLYSQualys	$669M	78%	24.5%	25%	40%
MQMarqeta Inc.	$625M	45%	-28.0%	-57%	10%
FSLYFastly Inc.	$624M	54%	-30.9%	-13%	-21%
VRNSVaronis	$624M	85%	-23.5%	-22%	5%
NCNOnCino	$595M	59%	-20.4%	-6%	2%
EVCMEverCommerce	$589M	—	-4.9%	-1%	16%
Group median	—	68%	-21.9%	-9%	8%

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 Marqeta Inc. has delivered.

Marqeta Inc.’s latest year runs above its own through-cycle margin — the reported figure may flatter a peak. So the tool opens on the through-cycle base, Graham’s averaging cutting both ways; clear the toggle below to read the latest year exactly as reported.

Today’s price $

Through the cycle, Marqeta Inc. earns about $66M on its 10.5% median owner-earnings margin. This year’s 25.7% margin runs above that; the reported figure may flatter a peak you'd be paying on. Normalize, below, values the price on that through-cycle figure rather than the latest year. It comes pre-checked here for that reason, the same rule that already normalizes a trough; clear it to price the year as filed.

Base Normalize · through-cycle ($66M) Net of stock comp (−$99M)

—

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+54%/yr

Owner-earnings growth · ’19→’25+41%/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 $147M on 429M shares outstanding (a weighted basic average, the only count this filer tags); net cash $675M. The base opens on the through-cycle figure (the latest year sits above the record’s own median, and Graham’s averaging cuts both ways); clear Normalize to use the year as filed. 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 MQ against another business →

The owners of MQ: the meeting and the votes →

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

Manual order: ← MPWR its page in the Manual MRAM →

Industry order: ← MOMO the Software chapter MSFT →