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PRAA, PRA Group Inc.

We are organized on a geographic basis, with our principal markets in the U.S. and Europe, where we have operations in 12 countries and the United Kingdom.

To a lesser extent, we also purchase loans in situations where the customer is involved in a bankruptcy or similar proceeding ("Insolvency" accounts).

As part of an ancillary business, we purchase and provide fee-based services for class action claims recoveries in the U.S.

Latest annual: FY2025 10-K

PRAA · PRA Group Inc.

The business

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

Revenue · FY2025

$1.2B

+7.8% YoY · 162% 5-yr CAGR

Vital signs · TTM, with 5-yr average

Revenue $1.2B 5-yr avg $820M

Operating margin −0.1% 5-yr avg 524.2%

ROIC −0% 5-yr avg 5%

Owner-earnings margin −1% 5-yr avg 95%

Free cash flow margin −1% 5-yr avg 95%

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 284% 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 operating margin has swung widely — from −2.5% to 3587% over the years — so the through-cycle figure carries more than any single year, and the worst year more than the best. Capital spending runs about 18% 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. On its own account, the filing leans hardest on concentrated dependence, 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 6%, above 15% in 0 of 9 years). By owner earnings: roughly 124% of revenue reaches owners as cash, though it swings. 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.

Where the money comes from

read the 10-K →

49% of revenue comes from outside the United States.

Revenue by geography, FY2025

United States51%$611M
Foreign Countries35%$421M
United Kingdom14%$170M

From the segment footnote of the company's own 10-K. 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, 2016–2025

realized figures from each filing · older years to the left

2016’16	2017’17	2018’18	2019’19	2020’20	2021’21	2022’22	2023’23	2024’24	2025’25	TTMTTMMar 2026
											Income statement
$77M	$25M	$15M	$16M	$10M	$15M	$967M	$803M	$1.1B	$1.2B	$1.2B	RevenueRevenue
$220M	$214M	$185M	$248M	$350M	$375M	$286M	$100M	$340M	($30M)	($2M)	Operating incomeOp. inc.
284.0%	857.8%	n/m	n/m	n/m	n/m	29.6%	12.5%	30.5%	−2.5%	−0.1%	Operating marginOp. mgn
$86M	$164M	$66M	$86M	$149M	$183M	$117M	($83M)	$71M	($305M)	($281M)	Net incomeNet inc.
34%	-7%	17%	19%	22%	23%	24%	—	23%	—	—	Effective tax rateTax rate
											Cash flow & returns
$206M	$15M	$81M	$133M	$142M	$85M	$22M	($98M)	($95M)	($86M)	($8M)	Operating cash flowOp. cash
$18M	$15M	$15M	$16M	$16M	$15M	$15M	$13M	$11M	$9M	$9M	DepreciationDeprec.
$95M	($173M)	($8M)	$21M	($38M)	($129M)	($124M)	($38M)	($189M)	$195M	$247M	Working capital & otherWC & other
$14M	$23M	$21M	$18M	$17M	$11M	$13M	$3M	$4M	$5M	$5M	CapexCapex
18.3%	91.7%	137.6%	114.4%	176.8%	76.3%	1.4%	0.4%	0.4%	0.4%	0.4%	Capex / revenueCapex/rev
$192M	$75K	$66M	$115M	$124M	$74M	$8M	($100M)	($99M)	($90M)	($13M)	Owner earningsOwner earn.
247.8%	0.3%	440.9%	731.5%	n/m	501.5%	0.9%	−12.5%	−8.9%	−7.5%	−1.1%	Owner earnings marginOE mgn
$192M	($7M)	$60M	$115M	$124M	$74M	$8M	($100M)	($99M)	($90M)	($13M)	Free cash flowFCF
247.8%	−29.6%	404.6%	731.5%	n/m	501.5%	0.9%	−12.5%	−8.9%	−7.5%	−1.1%	Free cash flow marginFCF mgn
$60M	$0	$0	$58M	$0	$647K	$0	$0	—	—	$0	AcquisitionsAcquis.
$0	$45M	$0	$0	$0	$201M	$111M	$0	$0	$20M	—	BuybacksBuybacks
6%	7%	4%	5%	7%	8%	6%	—	6%	-1%	-0%	ROICROIC
10%	15%	6%	7%	11%	14%	10%	-7%	6%	-31%	-28%	Return on equityROE
10%	15%	6%	7%	11%	14%	10%	−7%	6%	−31%	−28%	Retained to equityRetained/eq
											Balance sheet
$94M	$121M	$99M	$120M	$109M	$88M	$83M	$113M	$106M	$104M	$125M	Cash & investmentsCash+inv
$500M	$527M	$464M	$481M	$493M	$480M	$436M	$432M	$396M	$27M	$27M	GoodwillGoodwill
$3.2B	$3.7B	$3.9B	$4.4B	$4.5B	$4.4B	$4.2B	$4.5B	$4.9B	$5.1B	$5.2B	Total assetsAssets
$1.8B	$2.2B	$2.5B	$2.8B	$2.7B	$2.6B	$2.5B	$2.9B	$3.3B	$3.7B	$3.8B	Total debtDebt
$1.7B	$2.0B	$2.4B	$2.7B	$2.6B	$2.5B	$2.4B	$2.8B	$3.2B	$3.6B	$3.7B	Net debt / (cash)Net debt
2.6×	2.1×	1.5×	1.7×	2.5×	3.0×	2.2×	0.5×	—	—	-0.0×	Interest coverageInt. cov.
$864M	$1.1B	$1.1B	$1.2B	$1.3B	$1.3B	$1.2B	$1.2B	$1.1B	$980M	$1.0B	Shareholders’ equityEquity
7.9%	34.8%	57.1%	68.0%	147.6%	108.4%	1.3%	1.4%	1.2%	1.3%	1.3%	Stock comp / revenueSBC/rev
											Per share
46.4M	45.8M	45.4M	45.6M	45.9M	45.3M	39.9M	39.2M	39.5M	39.2M	38.5M	Shares out (diluted)Shares
$1.67	$0.54	$0.33	$0.35	$0.21	$0.32	$24.23	$20.49	$28.19	$30.68	$32.37	Revenue / shareRev/sh
$1.86	$3.59	$1.44	$1.89	$3.26	$4.04	$2.94	$-2.13	$1.79	$-7.79	$-7.29	EPS (diluted)EPS
$4.13	$0.00	$1.45	$2.53	$2.71	$1.63	$0.21	$-2.56	$-2.49	$-2.31	$-0.35	Owner earnings / shareOE/sh
$4.13	$-0.16	$1.33	$2.53	$2.71	$1.63	$0.21	$-2.56	$-2.49	$-2.31	$-0.35	Free cash flow / shareFCF/sh
$0.31	$0.50	$0.45	$0.40	$0.38	$0.25	$0.33	$0.07	$0.10	$0.12	$0.14	Cap. spending / shareCapex/sh
$18.63	$23.80	$24.11	$25.66	$29.26	$28.38	$30.78	$29.79	$28.70	$25.01	$26.03	Book value / shareBVPS

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

	9-yr	5-yr
Revenue / share	+38.2%/yr	+170.3%/yr
Capital spending / share	−9.6%/yr	−20.0%/yr
Book value / share	+3.3%/yr	−3.1%/yr

The record, charted

FY2016–2025

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

Share count

39Mpeak FY2016

ROIC

−1%low FY2025

Net debt ÷ owner earnings

289.1×peak FY2017

Owner earnings vs. net income

Owner earningsNet income

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

($90M)owner earningsvs.($305M)net incomelow FY2023

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.

FY2016FY2022

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 $305M loss into ($90M) 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	($305M)	$71M	($83M)	$117M	$183M
Depreciation & amortizationnon-cash charge added back	+$9M	+$11M	+$13M	+$15M	+$15M
Stock-based compensationreal costnon-cash, but a real cost	+$16M	+$13M	+$11M	+$13M	+$16M
Working capital & othertiming of cash in and out, other non-cash items	+$195M	−$189M	−$38M	−$124M	−$129M
Cash from operations	($86M)	($95M)	($98M)	$22M	$85M
Capital expenditurecash put back in to keep running and to grow	−$5M	−$4M	−$3M	−$13M	−$11M
Owner earnings	($90M)	($99M)	($100M)	$8M	$74M
Owner-earnings marginowner earnings ÷ revenue	-8%	-9%	-13%	1%	501%

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 $16M), owner earnings is nearer ($106M).

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? -0.2×

Does not cover its interest

Operating income ($30M) ÷ interest expense $195M

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.
How heavy is the debt, net of cash? $3.6B

Net debt against an operating loss

Cash $104M − debt $3.7B

What this means
Netting $104M of cash and short-term investments against $3.7B of debt leaves $3.6B owed, with no operating profit this year to measure it against — understand that combination before anything else about the company. 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

9-yr median, range -1%–8%; -1% latest = NOPAT ($24M) ÷ invested capital $4.6B

Industry peers: median 7%

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 9 years (it ran -1% 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 1%

Thin through the cycle

10-yr median margin, range -13%–1277%; latest ($90M) = operating cash ($86M) − maintenance capex $5M

Industry peers: median 29%

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 1% median across 10 years. Treating stock comp as the real expense it is (less $16M of SBC) leaves ($106M).
Are earnings backed by cash? ($86M)

Loss, and burning cash

Net income ($305M) · cash from operations ($86M)

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 not.

How is the cash used?

Where do the earnings go? —

No surplus to allocate

What this means
The business didn't generate positive Owner Earnings this year, so any distributions came from the balance sheet or borrowing, not from operations.
Investing or harvesting? 0.55×

Harvesting

Capex $5M ÷ depreciation $9M

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 Near

Revenue ≥ $2B · $1.2B

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 —

Current ratio ≥ 2× · —

What this means
Current assets / liabilities not in the data yet.
Earnings stability Miss

A profit every year (10-yr record) · 2 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 Miss

Earnings +33% over the record · −201%

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 $-2.78/share (latest year $-8.00), the averaged base the calculator's gate runs on, and book value is $25.69/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, 2016–2025

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

Profitable years 8 of 10

What this means
Lost money in 2 year(s), look at what happened there before trusting the average.
Return on capital ≥ 15% 0 of 10 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 795% → 13% (3-yr avg ends)

What this means
Through the cycle the operating margin slipped — about 795% early to 13% lately, median 284% — competition or costs are biting in.
Reinvestment, incremental ROIC −5%

What this means
Reinvested capital came back at a negative incremental return over this window — the invested base grew while operating profit did not. The filings show where it went.
Worst year 2025 · −2.5% op. margin

What this means
Operations went underwater in 2025, understand why before trusting the good years.
Share count −1.9%/yr

What this means
The share count is shrinking, buybacks are quietly growing your slice of the business.

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.

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 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, and the company is using it that way.

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.

How the cash was used, 2016–2025

Over the record, the business generated $406M of operating cash; how management split it reads as a cash returner, paying most of what it earns straight back to owners.

Reinvested$129M · 32%
Buybacks$377M · 93%

Returned to owners$377M
130% of the owner earnings the business produced over the span, $0 as dividends and $377M as buybacks.
Source of funding−$100M
Reinvestment and shareholder returns ran $100M beyond the operating cash the business generated, so the gap was financed off the balance sheet: debt rose from $1.8B to $3.8B.
Average price paid for buybacks$43.53
Across the years where the filing reports a share count, 7M shares were bought for $312M, about $43.53 each.
Net change in share count−17.0%
The diluted count fell from 46M to 39M, 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.
Return on what it retained−116%
Of the earnings it kept rather than paid out ($157M over the span), annual owner earnings (first three years vs last three) fell $182M, so each retained $1 gave back about 1.16 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 10-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$31M1% of all assets; the premium carried on the balance sheet for businesses acquired

Against book equity3%goodwill is this share of book equity; the rest is the company’s own retained and paid-in capital

Cash spent acquiring$118Mover 10 years buying other businesses, against $129M of capital spent building

$413M written down across 1 year (2025): goodwill the company has already conceded it overpaid for, charged against earnings. A write-down costs no cash (the cash went out when the deal was signed), but it is management marking its own past judgment to market.

Goodwill, acquired intangibles and equity from the latest balance sheet; acquisition spend and write-downs summed across the 10-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	Kevin P. Stevenson	$5.6M	$8.9M	$74M
2022	Kevin P. Stevenson	$5.0M	$463k	$8M
2023	Kevin P. Stevenson	$6.6M	$1.9M	($100M)
2023	Vikram A. Atal	$3.1M	$2.6M	($100M)
2024	Vikram A. Atal	$7.5M	$6.0M	($99M)
2025	Martin Sjolund	$4.9M	$4.9M	($90M)
2025	Vikram A. Atal	$7.1M	$4.8M	($90M)

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 ownership2.2%
The stake all directors and executive officers hold together, per the 2026 proxy: skin in the game, the first thing Munger reads.
CEO pay ratio89:1
What the chief earns for every dollar the median employee makes, per the 2026 proxy. A high ratio alone settles nothing; some businesses are genuinely top-heavy in scarce skill. A runaway figure is where Buffett starts asking whether the board is doing its job.
Stock-based compensation$16M
The slice of the business handed to employees in shares this year, 1% 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.

Inverting the record

Invert: instead of why PRA Group 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 2016–2025.

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

Look hereIs it less profitable than it was?−8.2% vs 0.6%
The owner-earnings margin averaged 0.6% early in the record and −8.2% across the last three years, and the latest year has not recovered. Ask the filing whether that is a structural drift or a cyclical trough — price, mix, cost, or a competitor — and whether it is permanent.
Look hereDid debt outgrow the business?$1.8B → $3.8B
Debt rose from $1.8B to $3.8B while owner earnings went from about $86M to ($96M): the borrowing grew and the earnings that would carry it are not there now. Debt raised for buybacks or deals rather than growth is the kind that bites in a downturn.
Look hereDid reported profit become cash?0.76×
Across the record the business reported $534M of net income but generated $406M of operating cash, a 0.76-to-one conversion. Profit that does not turn into cash over many years is the classic mark of earnings that are softer than they look. Ask where the gap sits, receivables, inventory, or costs being capitalized rather than expensed.

And these came back clean

Did the share count rise anyway?
Are "one-time" charges a yearly habit?

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 Revenue recognition, Income taxes 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, Consumer Finance

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
CACCCredit Acceptance Corporation	$2.3B	—	45.7%	10%	54%
PGYPagaya Technologies Ltd.	$1.3B	41%	-1.3%	4%	3%
PRAAPRA Group Inc.	$1.2B	—	570.9%	6%	124%
ONITOnity Group Inc.	$1.1B	—	41.0%	2%	15%
PWPPerella Weinberg Partners	$751M	—	-7.6%	—	15%
RMRegional Management Corp.	$646M	—	21.6%	6%	43%
JCAPJefferson Capital Inc.	$613M	—	50.8%	13%	—
WRLDWorld Acceptance Corporation	$585M	—	16.9%	8%	44%
Group median	—	—	31.3%	6%	43%

The price

What a price has to assume.

What the price implies

reverse-DCF

PRA Group 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.

Today’s price $

The assumptions Required return 9% Years to get there 10 Revenue growth 0%

Revenue, delivered10%/yr’20→’25

Mature owner-earnings margin 15%

Enter a price to run it.

Owner earnings it must reach—

Margin the price demands—

Owner-earnings margin today−1%

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.

Weigh PRAA against another business →

The owners of PRAA: the meeting and the votes →

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

Manual order: ← PRA its page in the Manual PRCH →

Industry order: ← ORBS the Consumer Finance chapter RM →