Owner Scorecard


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PRG, PROG Holdings Inc.

PROG Holdings is a financial technology holding company that provides transparent and competitive payment options to consumers.

PROG Holdings also owns MoneyApp, a mobile application that offers customers interest-free cash advances.

Latest annual: FY2025 10-K
PRG · PROG Holdings Inc.
I

The business

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

Revenue · FY2025
$2.4B
+0.4% YoY · −1% 5-yr CAGR
Vital signs · TTM, with 5-yr average
Revenue $2.5B 5-yr avg $2.5B
Operating margin 8.7% 5-yr avg 9.1%
ROIC 10% 5-yr avg 16%
Owner-earnings margin 12% 5-yr avg 9%
Free cash flow margin 12% 5-yr avg 9%

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 about 8.1% 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 1.3% to 12% over the years — so the through-cycle figure carries more than any single year, and the worst year more than the best. 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 run in the teens (median 15%, above 15% in 3 of 7 years). Owner earnings agree: roughly 10% of revenue reaches owners as cash, consistently. Returns like these are solid but short of clear franchise economics; whether they hold is what the 10-K settles, not the multiple.

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

II

The record

Ten years of arithmetic, read across the cycle.

The record, 2018–2025

realized figures from each filing · older years to the left
2018’182019’192020’202021’212022’222023’232024’242025’25TTMTTMMar 2026
Income statement
$2.0B$2.2B$2.5B$2.7B$2.6B$2.3B$2.4B$2.4B$2.5BRevenueRevenue
14%15%14%16%17%SG&A / revenueSG&A/rev
$157M$28M$272M$334M$186M$219M$195M$207M$216MOperating incomeOp. inc.
7.7%1.3%10.9%12.5%7.1%9.3%8.1%8.6%8.7%Operating marginOp. mgn
$196M$31M($61M)$244M$99M$139M$197M$147M$148MNet incomeNet inc.
14%26%33%29%25%25%Effective tax rateTax rate
Cash flow & returns
$356M$317M$456M$246M$242M$204M$139M$335M$297MOperating cash flowOp. cash
$7M$9M$10M$11M$34M$31M$26M$24M$32MDepreciationDeprec.
$125M$250M$510M($30M)$92M$9M($114M)$135M$88MWorking capital & otherWC & other
$79M$93M$64M$10M$10M$10M$8M$10M$11MCapexCapex
3.9%4.3%2.6%0.4%0.4%0.4%0.3%0.4%0.5%Capex / revenueCapex/rev
$278M$224M$392M$236M$233M$195M$130M$325M$286MOwner earningsOwner earn.
13.6%10.4%15.8%8.8%9.0%8.3%5.4%13.5%11.6%Owner earnings marginOE mgn
$278M$224M$392M$236M$233M$195M$130M$325M$286MFree cash flowFCF
13.6%10.4%15.8%8.8%9.0%8.3%5.4%13.5%11.6%Free cash flow marginFCF mgn
$15M$23M$0$0AcquisitionsAcquis.
$6M$9M$14M$0$0$0$20M$21M$21MDividends paidDiv. paid
$169M$69M$0$142M$224M$140M$139M$52MBuybacksBuybacks
8%1%23%12%15%16%15%10%ROICROIC
11%2%-6%36%17%23%30%20%19%Return on equityROE
11%1%−8%36%17%23%27%17%16%Retained to equityRetained/eq
Balance sheet
$15M$58M$37M$170M$132M$155M$91M$309M$69MCash & investmentsCash+inv
$67M$61M$66M$65M$68M$80M$74M$388MReceivablesReceiv.
$67M$61M$66M$65M$68M$80M$74M$390MOperating working capitalOper. WC
$289M$289M$306M$296M$296M$296M$296M$407MGoodwillGoodwill
$3.3B$1.3B$1.6B$1.5B$1.5B$1.5B$1.6B$2.0BTotal assetsAssets
$0$50M$590M$591M$592M$644M$595M$936MTotal debtDebt
($58M)$13M$419M$459M$437M$553M$286M$867MNet debt / (cash)Net debt
1453.3×62.7×5.0×5.5×4.9×4.2×3.7×Interest coverageInt. cov.
$1.8B$1.7B$986M$679M$570M$591M$650M$746M$774MShareholders’ equityEquity
1.4%1.2%−0.1%0.8%0.7%1.1%1.2%1.2%1.2%Stock comp / revenueSBC/rev
Per share
70.6M67.3M68.0M66.4M52.1M46.5M43.5M40.9M40.8MShares out (diluted)Shares
$28.84$32.13$36.53$40.32$49.89$50.25$55.09$58.96$60.47Revenue / shareRev/sh
$2.78$0.47$-0.90$3.67$1.90$2.98$4.53$3.59$3.63EPS (diluted)EPS
$3.93$3.33$5.76$3.56$4.47$4.18$2.99$7.95$7.00Owner earnings / shareOE/sh
$3.93$3.33$5.76$3.56$4.47$4.18$2.99$7.95$7.00Free cash flow / shareFCF/sh
$0.09$0.14$0.20$0.00$0.00$0.00$0.47$0.51$0.52Dividends / shareDiv/sh
$1.12$1.38$0.95$0.14$0.19$0.21$0.19$0.25$0.28Cap. spending / shareCapex/sh
$24.94$25.81$14.50$10.23$10.95$12.70$14.93$18.27$18.97Book value / shareBVPS
Per-share growththe realized rate an owner's share compounded
7-yr5-yr
Revenue / share+10.8%/yr+10.0%/yr
Owner earnings / share+10.6%/yr+6.7%/yr
EPS+3.7%/yr
Dividends / share+28.4%/yr+20.2%/yr
Capital spending / share−19.4%/yr−23.6%/yr
Book value / share−4.4%/yr+4.7%/yr

The record, charted

FY2018–2025

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

Share count
41Mpeak FY2018
ROIC
15%low FY2019
Net debt ÷ owner earnings
0.9×peak FY2024

Owner earnings vs. net income

Owner earningsNet income

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

$325Mowner earningsvs.$147Mnet incomelow FY2024

Where the cash went

ReinvestBuybacksDividendsAcquisitionsRetained

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

FY2018FY2025

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 $147M of profit into $325M 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$147M
Owner earnings$325M · 13% of revenue
FY2025FY2024FY2023FY2022FY2021
Reported net income$147M$197M$139M$99M$244M
Depreciation & amortizationnon-cash charge added back+$24M+$26M+$31M+$34M+$11M
Stock-based compensationreal costnon-cash, but a real cost+$29M+$29M+$25M+$18M+$21M
Working capital & othertiming of cash in and out, other non-cash items+$135M−$114M+$9M+$92M−$30M
Cash from operations$335M$139M$204M$242M$246M
Capital expenditurecash put back in to keep running and to grow−$10M−$8M−$10M−$10M−$10M
Owner earnings$325M$130M$195M$233M$236M
Owner-earnings marginowner earnings ÷ revenue13%5%8%9%9%

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 $29M), owner earnings is nearer $296M.

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?

  • Adequate
    Operating income $207M ÷ interest expense $49M
    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? $286M · 1.4× operating profit
    Modest net debt
    Cash $309M − debt $595M
    What this means

    Netting $309M of cash and short-term investments against $595M of debt leaves $286M owed, about 1.4× a year's operating profit (2.9× 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.

  • Not enough data
    What this means

    The filing data didn't include the inputs for this check.

Is it a good business?

  • Solid through the cycle
    7-yr median, range 1%–23%; 15% latest = NOPAT $154M ÷ invested capital $1.0B
    Industry peers: median 5%
    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 7 years (it ran 15% 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.

  • Solid through the cycle
    8-yr median margin, range 5%–16%; latest $325M = operating cash $335M − maintenance capex $10M
    Industry peers: median 9%
    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 13% of revenue this year, a 9% median across 8 years. Treating stock comp as the real expense it is (less $29M of SBC) leaves $296M.

  • Cash-backed
    Cash from ops $335M ÷ net income $147M
    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?

  • Reinvests most of it
    Dividends + buybacks $73M ÷ Owner Earnings $325M
    What this means

    Of $325M Owner Earnings, $73M (22%) went back to shareholders, $21M dividends, $52M buybacks. Net of $29M stock comp, the real buyback was about $23M. Returning most of it is the mark of a mature business with little left to reinvest at a high return; reinvesting most could mean a long runway, or empire-building. The split doesn't say which; the return earned on it (see ROIC) does.

  • Investing or harvesting? 0.42×
    Harvesting
    Capex $10M ÷ depreciation $24M
    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 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 Pass
    Revenue ≥ $2B · $2.4B
    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 Near
    A profit every year (8-yr record) · 1 loss year
    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 · 5 of 8 yrs
    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 · +191%
    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 $4.02/share (latest year $3.66), the averaged base the calculator's gate runs on, and book value is $18.63/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, 2018–2025

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

  • Profitable years 7 of 8
    What this means

    Lost money in 1 year(s), look at what happened there before trusting the average.

  • Return on capital ≥ 15% 4 of 7 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 7% → 9% (3-yr avg ends)
    What this means

    Through the cycle the operating margin widened — about 7% early to 9% lately, median 8% — pricing power intact or improving.

  • Reinvestment, incremental ROIC returns capital
    What this means

    The capital base barely grew: this business returns cash through dividends and buybacks rather than reinvesting. Judge it on the cash returned, not on compounding.

  • Owner earnings growth −1%/yr
    What this means

    Owner earnings shrank about 1% a year over the record.

  • Worst year 2019 · 1.3% op. margin
    What this means

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

  • Share count −7.5%/yr
    What this means

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

  • Dividend record rising
    What this means

    Paid and raised the dividend across the record, the continuity Graham prized.

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.

How the cash was used, 2018–2025

Over the record, the business generated $2.3B of operating cash; how management split it reads as a balanced allocator, splitting cash between the business, owners, and the balance sheet.

  • Reinvested$283M · 12%
  • Dividends$71M · 3%
  • Buybacks$934M · 41%
  • Retained (debt / cash)$1.0B · 44%
  • Returned to owners$1.0B

    50% of the owner earnings the business produced over the span, $71M as dividends and $934M as buybacks.

  • Average price paid for buybacks

    Buybacks ran $934M over the span, but the filings don't tag the share count needed to deduce the average price paid.

  • Net change in share count−42.2%

    The diluted count fell from 71M to 41M, so the buybacks outran the stock issued to staff.

  • Dividend record$0.51/sh

    Paid in 5 of the years on record, the per-share dividend growing about 28% a year. It was cut at least once along the way.

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$354M22% of all assets; the premium carried on the balance sheet for businesses acquired
Against book equity40%goodwill is this share of book equity; the rest is the company’s own retained and paid-in capital
Cash spent acquiring$38Mover 8 years buying other businesses, against $283M of capital spent building

$10M written down across 1 year (2022): goodwill the company has already conceded it overpaid for, charged against earnings. That is roughly 27% of the cash it put into acquisitions over the span. 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 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 yearChief executivePay, as filed“Actually paid”Owner earnings
2021Steven A. Michaels$7.5M$6.5M$236M
2022Steven A. Michaels$3.5M−$1.2M$233M
2023Steven A. Michaels$9.2M$12.6M$195M
2024Steven A. Michaels$13.3M$20.6M$130M
2025Steven A. Michaels$9.9M$1.3M$325M

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 ownership3.7%

    The stake all directors and executive officers hold together, per the 2026 proxy: skin in the game, the first thing Munger reads.

  • Stock-based compensation$29M

    The slice of the business handed to employees in shares this year, 1% of revenue, equal to 14% 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 PROG Holdings 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 2018–2025.

1 of the 4 tests turned up something to look into; the other 3 came back clean.

  • Look hereAre "one-time" charges a yearly habit?6 of 8 years

    Management took an impairment or write-down in 6 of the last 8 years, $551M in all. Taken across the majority of the record, the "one-time" label is wearing thin — ask whether these are past deals coming due rather than genuinely isolated events. Read it beside the goodwill the company still carries.

And these came back clean
  • Is it less profitable than it was?
  • Did the share count rise anyway?
  • Did reported profit become cash?

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 →
  • How much of the revenue rides on one buyer?
    ≈$1.9B · 77% of revenue on the largest customers (TTM)
    “For example, during 2025, we derived 54.8% of our consolidated revenues from customers of Progressive Leasing's top three POS partners, and 77.0% of our consolidated revenues from customers of Progressive Leasing's top ten POS partners.”verify →
  • Which reported numbers are a judgment call?
    Management names Revenue recognition, Credit & receivables 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, Trading Companies & Distributors

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
UPBDUpbound Group Inc.$4.7B55%4.4%7%7%
ALAir Lease$3.0B55.1%5%54%
STGWStagwell Inc.$2.9B35%5.1%4%5%
CBZCBIZ$2.8B14%8.5%5%9%
AMNAMN Healthcare Services$2.7B33%9.2%13%8%
PRGPROG Holdings Inc.$2.4B8.3%15%10%
WSCWillScot$2.3B11.0%4%23%
ALITAlight Inc.$2.3B-3.6%-1%9%
Group median8.4%5%9%
IV

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 PROG Holdings Inc. has delivered.

PROG Holdings 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.

$

Through the cycle, PROG Holdings Inc. earns about $233M on its 9.7% median owner-earnings margin. This year’s 13.5% 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

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 · ’21→’25−1%/yr
Owner-earnings growth · ’18→’25−1%/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.

Free cash flow $286M on 40M shares outstanding, per the 10-Q cover, as of 2026-04-24; net debt $867M. 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. Capex ($11M) runs well above depreciation ($32M), so this is a build-out; Steady-state swaps total capex for maintenance (≈ depreciation), lifting the base to about $287M, 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.

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

Manual order: ← PRDO its page in the Manual PRGO →

Industry order: ← POOL the Trading Companies & Distributors chapter QXO →