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NVEE, NV5 Global

Professional Services diversified Serial acquirer

A diversified business; where the profit really comes from, and whether it is earned or bought, is what the segment detail settles.

Latest annual: FY2024 10-K

NVEE · NV5 Global

The business

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

Revenue · FY2024

$491M

+16.2% YoY · 3% 5-yr CAGR

Vital signs · TTM, with 5-yr average

Revenue $534M 5-yr avg $343M

Operating margin 9.6% 5-yr avg 15.5%

ROIC 4% 5-yr avg 5%

Owner-earnings margin 14% 5-yr avg 19%

Free cash flow margin 14% 5-yr avg 19%

The business in brief

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

Situation: Serial acquirer. Goodwill and acquired intangibles are 60% of assets, with meaningful acquisition spending in 6 of the record's 8 years; much of what this business is was bought, at prices the record carries.
What moves the needle: Operating margin has run about 8.8% through the cycle, a thin margin, where volume, cost discipline and the price it gets all bear on the result. The operating margin has swung widely — from 8.0% to 20% over the years — so the through-cycle figure carries more than any single year, and the worst year more than the best. Stock-based pay runs about 5.0% of sales, a real and recurring claim on owners that the GAAP margin understates.
Is it a good business?: Return on capital has sat near the cost of capital (median 7%). By owner earnings: roughly 9% of revenue reaches owners as cash, consistently. 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, 2016–2024

realized figures from each filing · older years to the left

2016’16	2017’17	2018’18	2019’19	2021’21	2022’22	2023’23	2024’24	TTMTTMJun 2025
									Income statement
$224M	$333M	$418M	$159M	$297M	$344M	$423M	$491M	$534M	RevenueRevenue
9%	8%	8%	27%	17%	19%	16%	18%	18%	SG&A / revenueSG&A/rev
$18M	$27M	$36M	$31M	$44M	$69M	$60M	$43M	$51M	Operating incomeOp. inc.
8.2%	8.0%	8.5%	19.7%	14.9%	20.0%	14.2%	8.8%	9.6%	Operating marginOp. mgn
$12M	$24M	$27M	$24M	$21M	$50M	$44M	$28M	$35M	Net incomeNet inc.
36%	3%	20%	18%	27%	20%	7%	-7%	4%	Effective tax rateTax rate
									Cash flow & returns
$15M	$18M	$35M	$40M	$96M	$94M	$62M	$57M	$99M	Operating cash flowOp. cash
$6M	$13M	$17M	$26M	$42M	$44M	$55M	$67M	$68M	DepreciationDeprec.
($5M)	($24M)	($16M)	($20M)	$18M	($19M)	($59M)	($63M)	($30M)	Working capital & otherWC & other
$985K	$2M	$2M	$3M	$10M	$16M	$17M	$17M	$24M	CapexCapex
0.4%	0.7%	0.5%	1.7%	3.3%	4.6%	4.1%	3.4%	4.5%	Capex / revenueCapex/rev
$14M	$15M	$33M	$37M	$86M	$78M	$45M	$40M	$75M	Owner earningsOwner earn.
6.4%	4.6%	7.8%	23.5%	29.0%	22.8%	10.7%	8.2%	14.1%	Owner earnings marginOE mgn
$14M	$15M	$33M	$37M	$86M	$78M	$45M	$40M	$75M	Free cash flowFCF
6.4%	4.6%	7.8%	23.5%	29.0%	22.8%	10.7%	8.2%	14.1%	Free cash flow marginFCF mgn
$46M	$61M	$58M	$348M	$882K	$6M	$189M	$64M	$18M	AcquisitionsAcquis.
8%	11%	9%	4%	5%	9%	6%	4%	4%	ROICROIC
8%	13%	8%	7%	5%	8%	6%	3%	4%	Return on equityROE
8%	13%	8%	7%	5%	8%	6%	3%	4%	Retained to equityRetained/eq
									Balance sheet
$36M	$19M	$41M	$32M	$65M	$39M	$45M	$50M	$39M	Cash & investmentsCash+inv
$76M	$71M	$98M	$131M	$143M	$146M	$153M	$199M	$201M	ReceivablesReceiv.
$14M	$18M	$23M	$36M	$40M	$58M	$54M	$82M	$80M	Accounts payablePayables
$62M	$52M	$76M	$95M	$103M	$88M	$98M	$117M	$121M	Operating working capitalOper. WC
$113M	$131M	$185M	$251M	$289M	$291M	$327M	$411M	$394M	Current assetsCur. assets
$44M	$56M	$73M	$114M	$136M	$161M	$177M	$210M	$203M	Current liabilitiesCur. liab.
2.6×	2.3×	2.5×	2.2×	2.1×	1.8×	1.9×	2.0×	1.9×	Current ratioCurr. ratio
$59M	$99M	$141M	$309M	$344M	$401M	$550M	$579M	$586M	GoodwillGoodwill
$221M	$306M	$439M	$893M	$881M	$936M	$1.2B	$1.3B	$1.3B	Total assetsAssets
$32M	$69M	$47M	$358M	$308M	$58M	$217M	$254M	$278M	Total debtDebt
($3M)	$50M	$6M	$326M	$243M	$19M	$172M	$204M	$239M	Net debt / (cash)Net debt
71.6×	13.7×	18.2×	13.7×	2.9×	11.0×	4.6×	2.5×	3.3×	Interest coverageInt. cov.
$148M	$180M	$318M	$356M	$394M	$625M	$775M	$833M	$865M	Shareholders’ equityEquity
1.0%	1.2%	1.6%	6.6%	5.0%	5.6%	5.3%	5.3%	4.9%	Stock comp / revenueSBC/rev
									Per share
47.7M	53.9M	57.5M	62.6M	63.6M	61.0M	61.9M	62.9M	63.5M	Shares out (diluted)Shares
$4.69	$6.18	$7.27	$2.54	$4.67	$5.63	$6.83	$7.82	$8.40	Revenue / shareRev/sh
$0.24	$0.45	$0.47	$0.38	$0.33	$0.82	$0.71	$0.44	$0.55	EPS (diluted)EPS
$0.30	$0.29	$0.57	$0.60	$1.36	$1.28	$0.73	$0.64	$1.19	Owner earnings / shareOE/sh
$0.30	$0.29	$0.57	$0.60	$1.36	$1.28	$0.73	$0.64	$1.19	Free cash flow / shareFCF/sh
$0.02	$0.04	$0.04	$0.04	$0.16	$0.26	$0.28	$0.27	$0.37	Cap. spending / shareCapex/sh
$3.11	$3.34	$5.52	$5.69	$6.20	$10.23	$12.52	$13.25	$13.61	Book value / shareBVPS

Share counts before 2022 are restated ×5 for a stock split, so per-share figures sit on one basis.

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

	8-yr	5-yr
Revenue / share	+6.6%/yr	+25.2%/yr
Owner earnings / share	+10.1%/yr	+1.5%/yr
EPS	+7.8%/yr	+3.2%/yr
Capital spending / share	+37.8%/yr	+45.0%/yr
Book value / share	+19.9%/yr	+18.4%/yr

The record, charted

FY2016–2024

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

Share count

63Mpeak FY2021

ROIC

4%low FY2019

Net debt ÷ owner earnings

5.0×peak FY2019

Owner earnings vs. net income

Owner earningsNet income

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

$40Mowner earningsvs.$28Mnet incomelow FY2016

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.

FY2016FY2024

Owner-earnings bridge

FY2019–FY2024cash-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 2024 the business turned $28M of profit into $40M 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$28M

Owner earnings$40M · 8% of revenue

	FY2024	FY2023	FY2022	FY2021	FY2019
Reported net income	$28M	$44M	$50M	$21M	$24M
Depreciation & amortizationnon-cash charge added back	+$67M	+$55M	+$44M	+$42M	+$26M
Stock-based compensationreal costnon-cash, but a real cost	+$26M	+$22M	+$19M	+$15M	+$10M
Working capital & othertiming of cash in and out, other non-cash items	−$63M	−$59M	−$19M	+$18M	−$20M
Cash from operations	$57M	$62M	$94M	$96M	$40M
Capital expenditurecash put back in to keep running and to grow	−$17M	−$17M	−$16M	−$10M	−$3M
Owner earnings	$40M	$45M	$78M	$86M	$37M
Owner-earnings marginowner earnings ÷ revenue	8%	11%	23%	29%	23%

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 $26M), owner earnings is nearer $14M.

Much of fiscal 2024's profit didn't arrive as operating cash; it sits in “working capital & other” above. That can be a real inventory or timing swing, or profit that doesn't run through operating cash at all: a heavy tax year, equity-method earnings, or investment income booked through investing. For a year like this, owner earnings understates the cash earned; the full cash-flow statement carries the rest.

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

FY2024 10-K · source on SEC EDGAR →

Will it survive?

Can it pay its interest? 2.5×

Adequate

Operating income $43M ÷ interest expense $17M

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? $228M · 5.2× operating profit

Heavy net debt

Cash $50M − debt $278M

What this means
Netting $50M of cash and short-term investments against $278M of debt leaves $228M owed, about 5.2× a year's operating profit (6.4× 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 6%

Below average through the cycle

8-yr median, range 4%–11%; 4% latest = NOPAT $43M ÷ invested capital $1.1B

Industry peers: median -9%

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 8 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 8%

Solid through the cycle

8-yr median margin, range 5%–29%; latest $40M = operating cash $57M − maintenance capex $17M

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 8% of revenue this year, a 8% median across 8 years. Treating stock comp as the real expense it is (less $26M of SBC) leaves $14M.
Are earnings backed by cash? 2.05×

Cash-backed

Cash from ops $57M ÷ net income $28M

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? —

Not enough data

What this means
The filing data didn't include the inputs for this check.
Investing or harvesting? 0.25×

Harvesting

Capex $17M ÷ depreciation $67M

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 · 2 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 · $491M

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× · 1.95×

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 Near

Debt ≤ working capital · $278M vs $201M 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 Pass

A profit every year (8-yr record) · no losses

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 Pass

Earnings +33% over the record · +95%

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 $0.61/share (latest year $0.42), the averaged base the calculator's gate runs on, and book value is $12.43/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, 2016–2024

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

Profitable years 8 of 8

What this means
Never lost money over the record, the earnings stability Graham insisted on.
Return on capital ≥ 15% 0 of 8 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 8% → 14% (3-yr avg ends)

What this means
Through the cycle the operating margin widened — about 8% early to 14% lately, median 9% — pricing power intact or improving.
Reinvestment, incremental ROIC 5%

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 +14%/yr

What this means
Owner earnings grew about 14% a year over the record.
Worst year 2017 · 8.0% op. margin

What this means
Stayed profitable even in its hardest year, the resilience that survives recessions.

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.

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 the latest quarter, Jun 28, 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 assets$394M

Cash & short-term investments$39M
Receivables$201M
Other current assets$154M

Current liabilities$203M

Debt due within a year$24M
Accounts payable$80M
Other current liabilities$99M

Current ratio1.95×all current assets ÷ what's due · Graham looked for 2×

Quick ratio1.95×stricter: inventory excluded

Cash ratio0.19×strictest: cash alone against what's due

Working capital$192Mthe cushion left after near-term bills

Debt due this year vs. cash$24M due · $39M cash covered by cash on hand, no refinancing forced · both figures from the Jun 28, 2025 balance sheet

Revenue, latest quarter vs. a year ago+8.9%the freshest read on whether the business is still growing

Current ratio, recent quarters1.6× → 1.9×

Deeper floors

Tangible book value$92Mequity stripped of goodwill & intangibles

Net current asset value($47M)Graham's net-net: current assets less all liabilities

Debt incl. operating leases$312M$34M of it operating leases

From the company's latest filing.

How the cash was used, 2016–2024

Over the record, the business generated $417M of operating cash; how management split it reads as a balanced allocator, splitting cash between the business, owners, and the balance sheet.

Reinvested$68M · 16%
Retained (debt / cash)$350M · 84%

Source of fundingOperating cash
Operating cash covered reinvestment and returns; over the span debt rose $246M and cash and short-term investments rose $4M.
Net change in share count33.2%
The diluted count rose from 48M to 64M: 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.
Return on what it retained15%
Of the earnings it kept rather than paid out ($229M over the span), annual owner earnings (first three years vs last three) grew $34M, so each retained $1 added about 0.15 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.

Acquisitions & goodwill

from the balance sheet & the 8-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$786M60% of all assets; the premium carried on the balance sheet for businesses acquired

Against book equity70%goodwill is this share of book equity; the rest is the company’s own retained and paid-in capital

Cash spent acquiring$773Mover 8 years buying other businesses, against $68M 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 8-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	Mr. Dickerson Wright	$1.7M	$2.6M	$86M
2022	Mr. Dickerson Wright	$2.6M	$2.5M	$78M
2023	Mr. Dickerson Wright	$2.4M	$1.5M	$45M

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.

Stock-based compensation$26M
The slice of the business handed to employees in shares this year, 5% of revenue, equal to 60% 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 NV5 Global 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 2016–2024.

2 of the 5 tests turned up something to look into; the other 3 came back clean.

Look hereDid the share count rise anyway?33.2%
Diluted shares grew 33.2% over 2016–2024. Owners were diluted on net; each share owns less of the business than it did. Read the buyback line beside this one, not on its own.
Look hereDid debt outgrow the business?$32M → $278M
Debt rose from $32M to $278M while owner earnings went from about $21M to $55M — about 1.6 years of owner earnings in debt then, about 5.1 now: measured against what the business earns, the balance sheet carries more debt than it did. Debt raised for buybacks or deals rather than growth is the kind that bites in a downturn.

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.

Peers, Professional Services

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
DFINDonnelley Financial Solutions, Inc.	$767M	—	13.2%	17%	10%
XMTRXometry Inc.	$687M	38%	-20.2%	-10%	-18%
FLYWFlywire	$623M	—	-6.6%	-9%	8%
IMXIInternational Money Express Inc.	$608M	—	14.5%	40%	6%
ARLOArlo Technologies Inc.	$529M	25%	-9.4%	-46%	-6%
NVEENV5 Global	$491M	—	11.5%	7%	9%
LQDTLiquidity Services Inc.	$477M	—	6.4%	37%	12%
PHRPhreesia Inc.	$468M	—	-17.3%	-36%	-7%
Group median	—	—	-0.1%	-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 NV5 Global has delivered.

Today’s price $

Through the cycle, NV5 Global earns about $46M on its 9.4% median owner-earnings margin. This year’s 8.2% 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 ($46M) Net of stock comp (−$26M) Steady-state · maintenance capex ($82M)

—

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 · ’19→’24−7%/yr

Owner-earnings growth · ’16→’24+14%/yr

Owner-earnings yield—

P/E (3-yr earnings ’22–’24)—

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.

Free cash flow $75M on 67M shares outstanding, per the 10-Q cover, as of 2025-07-30; net debt $239M. 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. Capex ($24M) runs well above depreciation ($68M), so this is a build-out; Steady-state swaps total capex for maintenance (≈ depreciation), lifting the base to about $82M, the cash it would throw off if it stopped expanding. The dials set the multiple a growth belief justifies; the price, and every dollar on this page, is yours.

Weigh NVEE against another business →

Cite: Owner Scorecard, "NV5 Global (NVEE), the owner's record," https://ownerscorecard.com/c/NVEE, data as of 2026-07-09.

Manual order: ← NVEC its page in the Manual NVR →

Industry order: ← LICN the Professional Services chapter ONT →