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STX, Seagate Technology Holdings PLC

Technology Hardware consumer brand Cyclical

We are a leading provider of data storage technology and infrastructure solutions that enable enterprises and end users to confidently store and unlock the value of their data.

Our principal products are hard disk drives, commonly referred to as disk drives, hard drives or HDDs.

HDDs are devices that store digitally encoded data on rapidly rotating disks with magnetic surfaces.

Latest annual: FY2025 10-K

STX · Seagate Technology Holdings PLC

The business

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

Revenue · FY2025

$9.1B

+38.9% YoY · −3% 5-yr CAGR

Vital signs · TTM, with 5-yr average

Revenue $11.0B 5-yr avg $9.1B

Gross margin 42% 5-yr avg 27%

Operating margin 28.2% 5-yr avg 10.8%

ROIC 65% 5-yr avg 24%

Owner-earnings margin 22% 5-yr avg 10%

Free cash flow margin 22% 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.

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: Gross margin has run about 27% and operating margin about 12% through the cycle, a spread the cycle sets more than the company does. The margin is cyclical, swinging between −4.6% and 21% over the years, so the through-cycle figure carries more than any single year — and the balance sheet at the trough more than the peak. 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 high across the record (median 29%, above 15% in 7 of 10 years). Owner earnings agree: roughly 11% of revenue reaches owners as cash, consistently. Whether these returns reflect real pricing power or an accounting artifact is the judgment the 10-K is for.

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 →

52% of revenue comes from outside the United States.

Revenue by geography, FY2025

United States48%$4.4B
Singapore41%$3.8B
Netherlands10%$924M
Other0%$4M

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	TTMTTMApr 2026
											Income statement
$11.2B	$10.8B	$11.2B	$10.4B	$10.5B	$10.7B	$11.7B	$7.4B	$6.6B	$9.1B	$11.0B	RevenueRevenue
23%	29%	30%	28%	27%	27%	30%	18%	23%	35%	42%	Gross marginGross mgn
6%	6%	5%	4%	5%	5%	5%	7%	7%	6%	5%	SG&A / revenueSG&A/rev
11%	11%	9%	10%	9%	8%	8%	11%	10%	8%	7%	R&D / revenueR&D/rev
$445M	$1.1B	$1.6B	$1.5B	$1.3B	$1.5B	$2.0B	($342M)	$452M	$1.9B	$3.1B	Operating incomeOp. inc.
4.0%	9.8%	14.6%	14.3%	12.4%	14.0%	16.8%	−4.6%	6.9%	20.8%	28.2%	Operating marginOp. mgn
$248M	$772M	$1.2B	$2.0B	$1.0B	$1.3B	$1.6B	($529M)	$335M	$1.5B	$2.4B	Net incomeNet inc.
9%	5%	17%	—	3%	3%	2%	—	25%	3%	11%	Effective tax rateTax rate
											Cash flow & returns
$1.7B	$1.9B	$2.1B	$1.8B	$1.7B	$1.6B	$1.7B	$942M	$918M	$1.1B	$2.9B	Operating cash flowOp. cash
$815M	$749M	$598M	$541M	$379M	$397M	$451M	$513M	$264M	$251M	$267M	DepreciationDeprec.
$497M	$258M	$221M	($891M)	$222M	($197M)	($588M)	$843M	$192M	($837M)	$14M	Working capital & otherWC & other
$587M	$434M	$366M	$602M	$585M	$498M	$381M	$316M	$254M	$265M	$465M	CapexCapex
5.3%	4.0%	3.3%	5.8%	5.6%	4.7%	3.3%	4.3%	3.9%	2.9%	4.2%	Capex / revenueCapex/rev
$1.1B	$1.5B	$1.7B	$1.2B	$1.1B	$1.1B	$1.3B	$626M	$664M	$818M	$2.4B	Owner earningsOwner earn.
9.8%	13.8%	15.6%	11.2%	10.7%	10.6%	10.9%	8.5%	10.1%	9.0%	21.9%	Owner earnings marginOE mgn
$1.1B	$1.5B	$1.7B	$1.2B	$1.1B	$1.1B	$1.3B	$626M	$664M	$818M	$2.4B	Free cash flowFCF
9.8%	13.8%	15.6%	11.2%	10.7%	10.6%	10.9%	8.5%	10.1%	9.0%	21.9%	Free cash flow marginFCF mgn
$634M	$0	$0	—	—	—	—	$0	$0	$88M	$88M	AcquisitionsAcquis.
$727M	$561M	$726M	$713M	$673M	$649M	$610M	$582M	$585M	$600M	$621M	Dividends paidDiv. paid
$1.1B	$460M	$361M	$963M	$850M	$2.0B	$1.8B	$408M	$0	$0	—	BuybacksBuybacks
9%	26%	29%	35%	29%	31%	37%	-8%	12%	50%	65%	ROICROIC
16%	57%	71%	93%	56%	208%	1513%	—	—	—	217%	Return on equityROE
−30%	15%	27%	60%	19%	105%	953%	—	—	—	160%	Retained to equityRetained/eq
											Balance sheet
$1.1B	$2.5B	$1.9B	$2.2B	$1.7B	$1.2B	$615M	$786M	$1.4B	$891M	$1.1B	Cash & investmentsCash+inv
$1.3B	$1.2B	$1.2B	$989M	$1.1B	$1.2B	$1.5B	$621M	$429M	$959M	$1.2B	ReceivablesReceiv.
$868M	$982M	$1.1B	$970M	$1.1B	$1.2B	$1.6B	$1.1B	$1.2B	$1.4B	$1.5B	InventoryInvent.
$1.5B	$1.6B	$1.7B	$1.4B	$1.8B	$1.7B	$2.1B	$1.6B	$1.8B	$1.6B	$1.7B	Accounts payablePayables
$669M	$555M	$509M	$539M	$449M	$637M	$1.0B	$158M	($118M)	$795M	$1.0B	Operating working capitalOper. WC
$3.5B	$5.0B	$4.3B	$4.4B	$4.1B	$3.8B	$4.0B	$2.9B	$3.3B	$3.7B	$4.3B	Current assetsCur. assets
$2.2B	$2.6B	$3.2B	$2.2B	$2.7B	$2.9B	$3.6B	$2.6B	$3.1B	$2.6B	$3.2B	Current liabilitiesCur. liab.
1.6×	1.9×	1.4×	2.0×	1.5×	1.3×	1.1×	1.1×	1.1×	1.4×	1.3×	Current ratioCurr. ratio
$1.2B	$1.2B	$1.2B	$1.2B	$1.2B	$1.2B	$1.2B	$1.2B	$1.2B	$1.2B	$1.2B	GoodwillGoodwill
$8.2B	$9.3B	$9.4B	$8.9B	$8.9B	$8.7B	$8.9B	$7.6B	$7.7B	$8.0B	$8.9B	Total assetsAssets
$4.1B	$5.1B	$4.9B	$4.3B	$4.2B	$5.2B	$5.7B	$5.5B	$5.7B	$5.0B	$4.3B	Total debtDebt
$3.0B	$2.5B	$3.0B	$2.1B	$2.5B	$4.0B	$5.1B	$4.7B	$4.4B	$4.2B	$3.2B	Net debt / (cash)Net debt
2.3×	4.7×	6.9×	6.6×	6.5×	6.8×	7.9×	-1.1×	1.4×	5.9×	10.5×	Interest coverageInt. cov.
$1.6B	$1.4B	$1.7B	$2.2B	$1.8B	$631M	$109M	($1.2B)	($1.5B)	($453M)	$1.1B	Shareholders’ equityEquity
1.1%	1.3%	1.0%	1.0%	1.0%	1.0%	1.2%	1.6%	1.9%	2.2%	2.0%	Stock comp / revenueSBC/rev
											Per share
302M	299M	292M	285M	265M	245M	224M	207M	212M	217M	228M	Shares out (diluted)Shares
$36.95	$36.02	$38.30	$36.46	$39.66	$43.60	$52.06	$35.67	$30.90	$41.92	$48.29	Revenue / shareRev/sh
$0.82	$2.58	$4.05	$7.06	$3.79	$5.36	$7.36	$-2.56	$1.58	$6.77	$10.43	EPS (diluted)EPS
$3.62	$4.96	$5.98	$4.07	$4.26	$4.60	$5.70	$3.02	$3.13	$3.77	$10.58	Owner earnings / shareOE/sh
$3.62	$4.96	$5.98	$4.07	$4.26	$4.60	$5.70	$3.02	$3.13	$3.77	$10.58	Free cash flow / shareFCF/sh
$2.41	$1.88	$2.49	$2.50	$2.54	$2.65	$2.72	$2.81	$2.76	$2.76	$2.72	Dividends / shareDiv/sh
$1.94	$1.45	$1.25	$2.11	$2.21	$2.03	$1.70	$1.53	$1.20	$1.22	$2.04	Cap. spending / shareCapex/sh
$5.27	$4.56	$5.70	$7.59	$6.74	$2.58	$0.49	$-5.79	$-7.03	$-2.09	$4.80	Book value / shareBVPS

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

	9-yr	5-yr
Revenue / share	+1.4%/yr	+1.1%/yr
Owner earnings / share	+0.5%/yr	−2.4%/yr
EPS	+26.4%/yr	+12.3%/yr
Dividends / share	+1.6%/yr	+1.7%/yr
Capital spending / share	−5.0%/yr	−11.2%/yr

The record, charted

FY2016–2025

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

Share count

217Mpeak FY2016

ROIC

50%low FY2023

Gross margin

35%low FY2023

Net debt ÷ owner earnings

5.1×peak FY2023

Owner earnings vs. net income

Owner earningsNet income

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

$818Mowner earningsvs.$1.5Bnet 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.

FY2016FY2025

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 reported $1.5B of profit but $818M of owner earnings: $651M less than the profit line, taken out by capital spending and the timing of cash.

Reported net income$1.5B

Owner earnings$818M · 9% of revenue

	FY2025	FY2024	FY2023	FY2022	FY2021
Reported net income	$1.5B	$335M	($529M)	$1.6B	$1.3B
Depreciation & amortizationnon-cash charge added back	+$251M	+$264M	+$513M	+$451M	+$397M
Stock-based compensationreal costnon-cash, but a real cost	+$200M	+$127M	+$115M	+$145M	+$112M
Working capital & othertiming of cash in and out, other non-cash items	−$837M	+$192M	+$843M	−$588M	−$197M
Cash from operations	$1.1B	$918M	$942M	$1.7B	$1.6B
Capital expenditurecash put back in to keep running and to grow	−$265M	−$254M	−$316M	−$381M	−$498M
Owner earnings	$818M	$664M	$626M	$1.3B	$1.1B
Owner-earnings marginowner earnings ÷ revenue	9%	10%	8%	11%	11%

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 $200M), owner earnings is nearer $618M.

Much of fiscal 2025'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

FY2025 10-K · source on SEC EDGAR →

Will it survive?

Can it pay its interest? 5.9×

Comfortable

Operating income $1.9B ÷ interest expense $321M

What this means
Operating profit covers interest with the kind of margin Graham wanted for a defensive holding. Necessary, not sufficient, it says solvent, not cheap.
How heavy is the debt, net of cash? $4.2B · 2.2× operating profit

Meaningful net debt

Cash $891M − debt $5.0B

What this means
Netting $891M of cash and short-term investments against $5.0B of debt leaves $4.2B owed, about 2.2× a year's operating profit (2.7× 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? 28d

Tight

DSO 38 + DIO 89 − DPO 99 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.

Is it a good business?

Return on invested capital 29%

Very high (≥25%) through the cycle

10-yr median, range -8%–50%; 50% latest = NOPAT $1.8B ÷ invested capital $3.7B

Industry peers: median -2%

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 10 years (it ran 50% 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 11%

Solid through the cycle

10-yr median margin, range 8%–16%; latest $818M = operating cash $1.1B − maintenance capex $265M

Industry peers: median 12%

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 9% of revenue this year, a 11% median across 10 years. Treating stock comp as the real expense it is (less $200M of SBC) leaves $618M.
Are earnings backed by cash? 0.74×

Mostly cash-backed

Cash from ops $1.1B ÷ net income $1.5B

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? 73%

Returns about half

Dividends + buybacks $600M ÷ Owner Earnings $818M

What this means
Of $818M Owner Earnings, $600M (73%) went back to shareholders, $600M dividends, $0 buybacks. 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? 1.06×

Maintaining

Capex $265M ÷ depreciation $251M

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 Pass

Revenue ≥ $2B · $9.1B

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 Miss

Current ratio ≥ 2× · 1.38×

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 Miss

Debt ≤ working capital · $5.0B vs $1.0B 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 Near

A profit every year (10-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 Pass

Uninterrupted dividends · paid every year (10)

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 · −42%

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 $1.90/share (latest year $6.55), the averaged base the calculator's gate runs on, and book value is $-2.02/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 9 of 10

What this means
Lost money in 1 year(s), look at what happened there before trusting the average.
Return on capital ≥ 15% 7 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 9% → 8% (3-yr avg ends)

What this means
Through the cycle the operating margin held roughly steady — about 9% early, 8% lately, median 12%.
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 −6%/yr

What this means
Owner earnings shrank about 6% a year over the record.
Worst year 2023 · −4.6% op. margin

What this means
Operations went underwater in 2023, understand why before trusting the good years.
Share count −3.6%/yr

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

What this means
Paid a dividend in 10 of the years on record.

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 Framed as a capability

The filing positions AI as something the company uses, not something it fears.

“Use cases include connected and autonomous vehicles, smart manufacturing, smart cities and emerging generative AI ("Gen AI") applications.”

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.

Current Position

as of the latest quarter, Apr 3, 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$4.3B

Cash & short-term investments$1.1B
Receivables$1.2B
Inventory$1.5B
Other current assets$426M

Current liabilities$3.2B

Debt due within a year$398M
Accounts payable$1.7B
Other current liabilities$1.1B

Current ratio1.33×all current assets ÷ what's due · Graham looked for 2×

Quick ratio0.85×stricter: inventory excluded

Cash ratio0.35×strictest: cash alone against what's due

Working capital$1.1Bthe cushion left after near-term bills

Debt due this year vs. cash$398M due · $1.1B cash covered by cash on hand, no refinancing forced · both figures from the Apr 3, 2026 balance sheet

Revenue, latest quarter vs. a year ago+44.1%the freshest read on whether the business is still growing

Current ratio, recent quarters1.1× → 1.3×

Deeper floors

Tangible book value($126M)equity stripped of goodwill & intangibles

Net current asset value($3.5B)Graham's net-net: current assets less all liabilities

Debt incl. operating leases$4.2B$376M of it operating leases

Deferred revenue$194Mcustomer cash collected before delivery; operating float

From the company's latest filing.

Debt maturity

the debt note, SEC EDGAR →

Not how much it owes, but when it falls due, and against what. The ladder the company files, beside cash on hand and a year's owner earnings.

'26$0

'27$0

'28$1.5B

'29$470M

'30$638M

later$2.4B

Bars scaled to the largest single year; “later” is everything due after 2030, shown apart since it dwarfs the years.

Due in the next 12 months$0the first rung: what must be repaid or rolled over within the year

Within two years$0the near wall, the part most exposed to today’s credit conditions

Biggest single year$1.5Bin 2028the lumpiest maturity, where a refinancing, if needed, is largest

Total scheduled principal$5.0Bevery year plus what lies beyond, as the footnote totals it

Maturity schedule extracted from the company’s Jun 27, 2025 annual report and reconciled to the total the table states.

How the cash was used, 2016–2025

Over the record, the business generated $15.4B of operating cash; how management split it reads as a cash returner, paying most of what it earns straight back to owners.

Reinvested$4.3B · 28%
Dividends$6.4B · 42%
Buybacks$8.0B · 52%

Returned to owners$14.4B
130% of the owner earnings the business produced over the span, $6.4B as dividends and $8.0B as buybacks.
Source of funding−$3.3B
Reinvestment and shareholder returns ran $3.3B beyond the operating cash the business generated, so the gap was financed off the balance sheet.
Average price paid for buybacks$53.54
Across the years where the filing reports a share count, 149M shares were bought for $8.0B, about $53.54 each. Year to year the price paid ranged from $32.82 (2018) to $85.67 (2022); its heaviest year, 2021, paid $60.21 ($2.0B).
Net change in share count−24.5%
The diluted count fell from 302M to 228M, so the buybacks outran the stock issued to staff.
Dividend record$2.76/sh
Paid in 10 of the years on record, the per-share dividend growing about 2% 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.

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	William D. Mosley	$11.6M	$36.8M	$1.1B
2022	William D. Mosley	$13.2M	$3.6M	$1.3B
2023	William D. Mosley	$11.4M	$4.8M	$626M
2024	William D. Mosley	$13.6M	$31.3M	$664M
2025	William D. Mosley	$17.2M	$57.4M	$818M

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 ownership<1%
The stake all directors and executive officers hold together, per the 2025 proxy: skin in the game, the first thing Munger reads.
Stock-based compensation$200M
The slice of the business handed to employees in shares this year, 2% of revenue, equal to 11% 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 Seagate Technology Holdings PLC 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.

2 of the 6 tests turned up something to look into; the other 4 came back clean.

Look hereIs it less profitable than it was?9.2% vs 13.1%
The owner-earnings margin averaged 13.1% early in the record and 9.2% 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 receivables and inventory outpace sales?20% → 25% of sales
Receivables and inventory grew from $2.2B to $2.7B while revenue grew −1%: working capital is climbing faster than sales (20% of revenue then, 25% now). That can mean customers paying slower, stock building up, or revenue pulled forward. The filing's cash-flow and receivables notes say which.

And these came back clean

Did the share count rise anyway?
Did debt outgrow the business?
Did reported profit become cash?
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 →

How much of the revenue rides on one buyer?
≈$1.1B · 10% of revenue on the largest customer (TTM)
“In fiscal year 2025, one customer accounted for approximately 10 % of consolidated revenue.”verify →

The questions the record and the charts do not answer on their own; each carries the figure and the place to look.

Peers, Technology Hardware

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
WDCWestern Digital Corporation	$9.5B	28%	7.2%	6%	4%
PANWPalo Alto Networks Inc.	$9.2B	72%	-4.0%	-10%	38%
STXSeagate Technology Holdings PLC	$9.1B	28%	13.2%	29%	11%
ANETArista Networks Inc.	$9.0B	64%	32.4%	33%	33%
SNDKSandisk Corporation	$7.4B	16%	-18.7%	-11%	-7%
XRXXerox Holdings Corporation	$7.0B	—	-0.4%	-2%	8%
NTAPNetApp Inc.	$6.9B	67%	18.8%	70%	20%
PEverpure Inc.	$3.7B	69%	-8.1%	-12%	12%
Group median	—	64%	3.4%	2%	11%

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 Seagate Technology Holdings PLC has delivered.

Today’s price $

Through the cycle, Seagate Technology Holdings PLC earns about $969M on its 10.7% median owner-earnings margin. This year’s 9.0% margin runs below that; the reported figure may understate a lean year. Normalize, below, values the price on that through-cycle figure rather than the latest year.

Base Normalize · through-cycle ($969M) Net of stock comp (−$218M) Steady-state · maintenance capex ($2.6B)

—

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→’25−11%/yr

Owner-earnings growth · ’16→’25−6%/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 $2.4B on 224M shares outstanding, per the 10-Q cover, as of 2026-04-27; net debt $3.2B. 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 ($465M) runs well above depreciation ($267M), so this is a build-out; Steady-state swaps total capex for maintenance (≈ depreciation), lifting the base to about $2.6B, 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 STX against another business →

The owners of STX: the meeting and the votes →

Cite: Owner Scorecard, "Seagate Technology Holdings PLC (STX), the owner's record," https://ownerscorecard.com/c/STX, data as of 2026-07-09.

Manual order: ← STWD its page in the Manual STZ →

Industry order: ← SSYS the Technology Hardware chapter VYX →