Share count
380Mpeak FY2025
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PONY, Pony AI Inc.
Revenue is Virtual Driver Operation and Other Related Services (45%), Products (37%) and Engineering Solution Services (18%).
The business
What it sells, where the money comes from, the kind of company it is.
Revenue · FY2025
$90M
+20.0% YoY · 10% 3-yr CAGR
Vital signs · TTM
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 software business, earning high margins on code once it is written.
- 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. Capital build-out. Capital spending has surged to 49% of sales, today's earnings are charged less depreciation than tomorrow's will be. Net current asset value. Current assets alone exceed every liability combined, and the surplus is most of the balance sheet: the shape Graham called a net-net.
- What moves the needle
- Operating margin has run around −290% through the cycle on a 16% 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. Capital spending runs about 15% of sales, below what it charges for depreciation, so the return earned on what it sinks into that plant weighs as much as the margin. 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.
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 →Revenue spreads across 3 lines, the largest Virtual Driver Operation And Other Related Services at 45%.
Revenue by product line, FY2025
- Virtual Driver Operation And Other Related Services45%$40M
- Products37%$33M
- Engineering Solution Services18%$17M
By geographyChina97%Other Overseas Regions3%
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, 2022–2025
realized figures from each filing · older years to the left| 2022’22 | 2023’23 | 2024’24 | 2025’25 | TTMTTMDec 2025 | |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Income statement | |||||
| $68M | $72M | $75M | $90M | $90M | RevenueRevenue |
| 47% | 23% | 15% | 16% | 16% | Gross marginGross mgn |
| ($171M) | ($143M) | ($286M) | ($261M) | ($261M) | Operating incomeOp. inc. |
| −249.6% | −199.2% | −380.6% | −289.8% | −289.8% | Operating marginOp. mgn |
| ($148M) | ($125M) | ($275M) | ($77M) | ($77M) | Net incomeNet inc. |
| Cash flow & returns | |||||
| ($155M) | ($115M) | ($111M) | ($165M) | ($165M) | Operating cash flowOp. cash |
| $18M | $16M | $10M | $7M | $7M | DepreciationDeprec. |
| ($24M) | ($6M) | $154M | ($95M) | ($95M) | Working capital & otherWC & other |
| $12M | $5M | $11M | $44M | $44M | CapexCapex |
| 17.6% | 7.1% | 15.2% | 48.7% | 48.7% | Capex / revenueCapex/rev |
| ($167M) | ($121M) | ($122M) | ($172M) | ($172M) | Owner earningsOwner earn. |
| −243.9% | −167.6% | −162.8% | −191.2% | −191.2% | Owner earnings marginOE mgn |
| ($167M) | ($121M) | ($122M) | ($209M) | ($209M) | Free cash flowFCF |
| −243.9% | −167.6% | −162.8% | −232.0% | −232.0% | Free cash flow marginFCF mgn |
| — | — | -54% | -15% | -15% | ROICROIC |
| — | — | -29% | -5% | -5% | Return on equityROE |
| — | — | −29% | −5% | −5% | Retained to equityRetained/eq |
| Balance sheet | |||||
| $578M | $590M | $745M | $1.2B | $1.2B | Cash & investmentsCash+inv |
| $26M | $32M | $29M | $24M | $24M | ReceivablesReceiv. |
| $10M | $14M | $15M | $17M | $17M | Accounts payablePayables |
| $16M | $18M | $13M | $6M | $6M | Operating working capitalOper. WC |
| $644M | $666M | $835M | $1.3B | $1.3B | Current assetsCur. assets |
| $48M | $48M | $71M | $91M | $91M | Current liabilitiesCur. liab. |
| 13.4× | 13.8× | 11.8× | 13.7× | 13.7× | Current ratioCurr. ratio |
| $772M | $747M | $1.1B | $1.8B | $1.8B | Total assetsAssets |
| ($578M) | ($590M) | ($745M) | ($1.2B) | ($1.2B) | Net debt / (cash)Net debt |
| ($551M) | ($677M) | $951M | $1.7B | $1.7B | Shareholders’ equityEquity |
| Per share | |||||
| 85.3M | 89.1M | 114M | 380M | 380M | Shares out (diluted)Shares |
| $0.80 | $0.81 | $0.66 | $0.24 | $0.24 | Revenue / shareRev/sh |
| $-1.74 | $-1.41 | $-2.41 | $-0.20 | $-0.20 | EPS (diluted)EPS |
| $-1.96 | $-1.35 | $-1.07 | $-0.45 | $-0.45 | Owner earnings / shareOE/sh |
| $-1.96 | $-1.35 | $-1.07 | $-0.55 | $-0.55 | Free cash flow / shareFCF/sh |
| $0.14 | $0.06 | $0.10 | $0.12 | $0.12 | Cap. spending / shareCapex/sh |
| $-6.46 | $-7.60 | $8.32 | $4.35 | $4.35 | Book value / shareBVPS |
The diluted share count moved ×3.32 into 2025 — 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
| 3-yr | 5-yr | |
|---|---|---|
| Revenue / share | −33.4%/yr | −33.4%/yr (3-yr) |
| Capital spending / share | −6.4%/yr | −6.4%/yr (3-yr) |
The record, charted
FY2022–2025Each measure over its full record; the current point and the worst year marked.
Gross margin
16%low FY2024
Owner earnings vs. net income
Owner earningsNet incomeThe accountant's number, and the cash an owner can take; the gap is the tell.
($172M)owner earningsvs.($77M)net incomelow FY2025
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 earned ($172M) of owner earnings, the operating cash left after the $7M it takes just to hold its position. It put $37M more into growth; free cash flow, after that spending, was ($209M).
| FY2025 | FY2024 | FY2023 | FY2022 | |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Reported net income | ($77M) | ($275M) | ($125M) | ($148M) |
| Depreciation & amortizationnon-cash charge added back | +$7M | +$10M | +$16M | +$18M |
| Working capital & othertiming of cash in and out, other non-cash items | −$95M | +$154M | −$6M | −$24M |
| Cash from operations | ($165M) | ($111M) | ($115M) | ($155M) |
| Maintenance capital expenditurethe spending needed just to hold position and volume | −$7M | −$11M | −$5M | −$12M |
| Owner earnings | ($172M) | ($122M) | ($121M) | ($167M) |
| Growth capital expenditurediscretionary; spent to get bigger, not to stand still | −$37M | — | — | — |
| Free cash flow | ($209M) | ($122M) | ($121M) | ($167M) |
| Owner-earnings marginowner earnings ÷ revenue | -191% | -163% | -168% | -244% |
Owner earnings is the cash an owner could pull out without starving the business: operating cash less the maintenance capital it must spend to hold its position (here about $7M, roughly its depreciation, the rate its assets wear out). The other $37M of its capital spending is growth it chose, not upkeep it owed; charged only with the maintenance it must do, the business earns well more than the year's free cash flow shows.
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
FY2025 20-F · source on SEC EDGAR →
Will it survive?
- No meaningful interest burdenLittle or no interest expense reported
What this means
Little or no interest expense reported, the business isn't leaning on lenders to operate.
- Net cash, debt-freeCash $293M + ST investments $872M − debt $0
What this means
Cash and short-term investments exceed every dollar of debt by $1.2B, 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.
- TightDSO 96 + DIO 0 − DPO 83 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?
- Not enough dataIndustry peers: median -23%
What this means
The filing data didn't include the inputs for this check.
- Owner-earnings margin -191%Consumes cash through the cycle4-yr median margin, range -244%–-163%; latest ($172M) = operating cash ($165M) − maintenance capex $7MIndustry peers: median 2%
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 -191% of revenue this year, a -191% median across 4 years. It chose to put $37M more into growth, so free cash flow this year was ($209M) — the gap is investment, not weakness.
- Are earnings backed by cash? ($165M)Loss, and burning cashNet income ($77M) · cash from operations ($165M)
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 not.
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? 6.18×ExpandingCapex $44M ÷ depreciation $7M
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 2 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 MissRevenue ≥ $2B · $90M
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 PassCurrent ratio ≥ 2× · 13.67×
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.
- 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 $-0.37/share (latest year $-0.18), the averaged base the calculator's gate runs on, and book value is $3.81/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, 2022–2025
Whether the record’s returns held, and what the capital reinvested earned.
- Profitable years 0 of 4
What this means
Lost money in 4 year(s), look at what happened there before trusting the average.
- Operating margin −224% → −335% (2-yr avg ends)
What this means
Through the cycle the operating margin slipped — about −224% early to −335% lately, median −290% — competition or costs are biting in.
- Worst year 2024 · −380.6% op. margin
What this means
Operations went underwater in 2024, understand why before trusting the good years.
- How management talks about it Promotional
What this means
The returns have faded, yet the filing reaches for a promoter’s vocabulary — world-class, best-in-class, disruptive — more than an owner’s. When the words sell harder than the results deliver, the gap is the thing to weigh.
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.
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.
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, 2025Can 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$1.3B
- Cash & short-term investments$1.2B
- Receivables$24M
- Other current assets$61M
Current liabilities$91M
- Accounts payable$17M
- Other current liabilities$74M
Current ratio13.67×all current assets ÷ what's due · Graham looked for 2×
Quick ratio13.67×stricter: inventory excluded
Cash ratio12.74×strictest: cash alone against what's due
Working capital$1.2Bthe cushion left after near-term bills
Cash runway5.6 yrsthe business is consuming cash; this is how long the cash on hand lasts at that rate
Deeper floors
Tangible book value$1.7Bequity stripped of goodwill & intangibles
Net current asset value$1.1BGraham's net-net: current assets less all liabilities
Debt incl. operating leases$5M$5M of it operating leases
Deferred revenue$2Mcustomer cash collected before delivery; operating float
From the company's latest filing.
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 |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| TLSTelos Corporation | $165M | 36% | -8.5% | -61% | 2% |
| IONQIonQ Inc. | $130M | — | -715.7% | -23% | -405% |
| RUMRumble Inc. | $101M | — | -125.9% | -322% | -86% |
| GLOOGloo Holdings Inc. | $95M | — | -209.1% | -76% | -196% |
| RDVTRed Violet Inc. Common Stock | $90M | — | -3.0% | -3% | 20% |
| PONYPony AI Inc. | $90M | 20% | -269.7% | -15% | -179% |
| ISSCInnovative Solutions and Support Inc. | $84M | 55% | 16.9% | 11% | 12% |
| SLPSimulations Plus Inc. | $79M | 74% | 27.8% | 9% | 29% |
| Group median | — | 45% | -67.2% | -19% | -42% |
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 ADS represents one Class”; Pony AI Inc. reports in USD, so every figure in this tool is stated per ADS so your dollar quote reconciles exactly. The record tables elsewhere on this page remain as filed.
Pony AI Inc. is profitable, but owner earnings are negative this year because capital spending currently outruns operating cash, a build-out, so the owner-earnings reverse-DCF has no positive base to grow. We read the price from both ends instead: type a price to see the steady-state profitability it demands, then set the mature margin you would believe and weigh the two against each other. Nothing leaves your browser unless you enter it in your notebook.
$
The assumptions
Revenue, delivered9%/yr’22→’25
Enter a price to run it.
Owner earnings it must reach—
Margin the price demands—
Owner-earnings margin today−232%
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.
Two reads of one future. From your price: the owner earnings the company must reach, valued at a mature multiple and discounted back at your rate, expressed as the margin it implies on revenue grown at your rate. From your belief: the mature margin you would credit, set on the dial above. When the margin the price demands runs above the one you would believe, you are paying for a future taken on faith. For a deep cyclical at a trough, normalized through-cycle earnings are the better lens; this mode is for the genuinely unprofitable, and for the profitable business whose capital spending currently outruns its cash.
Cite: Owner Scorecard, "Pony AI Inc. (PONY), the owner's record," https://ownerscorecard.com/c/PONY, data as of 2026-07-09.
Manual order: ← POET its page in the Manual PRE →
Industry order: ← PLTR the Software chapter PPLI →