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TDAY, USA TODAY Co. Inc.

Publishing diversified Distress / turnaroundCyclicalSerial acquirer

For both the USA TODAY Media and Newsquest segments, we seek to strengthen the connection with our audience 5 by providing relevant content and expanded offerings that resonate with our readers.

As a media and digital marketing solutions company we are focused on sustainable growth.

Through our trusted brands, including the USA TODAY NETWORK, comprised of the national publication, USA TODAY, and our network of local properties , in the United States (the "U.S."), and Newsquest, a wholly-owned subsidiary operating in the United Kingdom (the " U.K.

Latest annual: FY2025 10-K

TDAY · USA TODAY Co. Inc.

The business

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

Revenue · FY2025

$2.3B

−8.3% YoY · −8% 5-yr CAGR

Vital signs · TTM, with 5-yr average

Revenue $2.3B 5-yr avg $2.7B

Gross margin 39% 5-yr avg 38%

Operating margin 0.7% 5-yr avg 1.6%

ROIC 1% 5-yr avg 0%

Owner-earnings margin 3% 5-yr avg 2%

Free cash flow margin 3% 5-yr avg 2%

The business in brief

read the 10-K →

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

Situation: Distress / turnaround. Thin interest coverage, or operating cash burned against real debt, across the record. The balance sheet carries this situation; the debt schedule sets the clock. Cyclical. Margins collapse and recover repeatedly across the record; a single year, good or bad, misstates the through-cycle earning power. Serial acquirer. Goodwill and acquired intangibles are 47% of assets, with meaningful acquisition spending in 4 of the record's 10 years; much of what this business is was bought, at prices the record carries.
What moves the needle: Gross margin has run about 40% and operating margin about 2.5% through the cycle, a solid spread between what it charges and what the product costs to make. The operating margin has swung widely — from −13% to 4.8% — on a steadier 40% gross margin, so what moves it sits below the gross line, in operating spend and one-off charges more than in the cost of the product itself. On its own account, the filing leans hardest on pricing power & competition, 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 −2%, above 15% in 0 of 7 years). Owner earnings, the cash-based check, have been thin too. 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.

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
$1.3B	$1.3B	$1.5B	$1.9B	$3.4B	$3.2B	$2.9B	$2.7B	$2.5B	$2.3B	$2.3B	RevenueRevenue
—	45%	43%	42%	40%	41%	37%	36%	38%	39%	39%	Gross marginGross mgn
33%	33%	33%	32%	29%	28%	29%	27%	28%	28%	27%	SG&A / revenueSG&A/rev
$61M	$34M	$58M	($147M)	($448M)	$109M	($34M)	$86M	($43M)	$96M	$17M	Operating incomeOp. inc.
4.8%	2.5%	3.8%	−7.9%	−13.2%	3.4%	−1.1%	3.2%	−1.7%	4.2%	0.7%	Operating marginOp. mgn
$32M	($915K)	$18M	($120M)	($670M)	($135M)	($78M)	($28M)	($26M)	$2M	$29M	Net incomeNet inc.
-8%	—	10%	—	—	—	—	—	—	—	33%	Effective tax rateTax rate
											Cash flow & returns
$95M	$111M	$110M	$26M	$58M	$127M	$41M	$95M	$100M	$114M	$110M	Operating cash flowOp. cash
$68M	$74M	$85M	$112M	$264M	$204M	$182M	$163M	$156M	$166M	$154M	DepreciationDeprec.
($7M)	$34M	$3M	$22M	$438M	$40M	($80M)	($57M)	($42M)	($62M)	($81M)	Working capital & otherWC & other
$11M	$11M	$12M	$14M	$37M	$40M	$45M	$38M	$50M	$51M	$51M	CapexCapex
0.8%	0.8%	0.8%	0.7%	1.1%	1.2%	1.5%	1.4%	2.0%	2.2%	2.2%	Capex / revenueCapex/rev
$84M	$99M	$98M	$12M	$21M	$88M	($5M)	$56M	$51M	$63M	$60M	Owner earningsOwner earn.
6.7%	7.4%	6.4%	0.6%	0.6%	2.7%	−0.2%	2.1%	2.0%	2.7%	2.6%	Owner earnings marginOE mgn
$84M	$99M	$98M	$12M	$21M	$88M	($5M)	$56M	$51M	$63M	$60M	Free cash flowFCF
6.7%	7.4%	6.4%	0.6%	0.6%	2.7%	−0.2%	2.1%	2.0%	2.7%	2.6%	Free cash flow marginFCF mgn
$137M	$164M	$205M	$797M	$0	$125K	$15M	$0	$0	—	$0	AcquisitionsAcquis.
$60M	$76M	$87M	$92M	$0	$0	—	—	—	—	$0	Dividends paidDiv. paid
$417K	$5M	$0	$0	$2M	$3M	$7M	$3M	$3M	$3M	—	BuybacksBuybacks
6%	—	5%	-5%	-20%	—	-2%	5%	-3%	—	1%	ROICROIC
4%	-0%	3%	-12%	-184%	-25%	-26%	-9%	-17%	1%	20%	Return on equityROE
−4%	−11%	−10%	−22%	−184%	−25%	—	—	—	—	20%	Retained to equityRetained/eq
											Balance sheet
$172M	$43M	$49M	$156M	$171M	$131M	$94M	$100M	$106M	$90M	$85M	Cash & investmentsCash+inv
$138M	$152M	$174M	$439M	$314M	$329M	$289M	$266M	$240M	$224M	$227M	ReceivablesReceiv.
$18M	$19M	$25M	$55M	$35M	$38M	$45M	$27M	$21M	$13M	$11M	InventoryInvent.
$19M	$16M	$17M	$147M	$132M	$157M	$189M	$142M	$154M	$144M	$142M	Accounts payablePayables
$137M	$155M	$183M	$347M	$218M	$209M	$146M	$151M	$106M	$92M	$96M	Operating working capitalOper. WC
$370M	$263M	$298M	$779M	$637M	$577M	$508M	$444M	$426M	$389M	$395M	Current assetsCur. assets
$196M	$204M	$248M	$718M	$741M	$663M	$617M	$534M	$546M	$518M	$499M	Current liabilitiesCur. liab.
1.9×	1.3×	1.2×	1.1×	0.9×	0.9×	0.8×	0.8×	0.8×	0.8×	0.8×	Current ratioCurr. ratio
$228M	$237M	$311M	$914M	$534M	$534M	$533M	$534M	$530M	$519M	$518M	GoodwillGoodwill
$1.3B	$1.3B	$1.4B	$4.0B	$3.1B	$2.8B	$2.4B	$2.2B	$2.0B	$1.8B	$1.8B	Total assetsAssets
$353M	$360M	$441M	$1.6B	$1.6B	$1.2B	$1.2B	$1.0B	$1.1B	$954M	$966M	Total debtDebt
$181M	$317M	$392M	$1.5B	$1.4B	$1.1B	$1.1B	$944M	$974M	$864M	$881M	Net debt / (cash)Net debt
2.0×	1.1×	1.6×	-2.3×	-2.0×	0.8×	-0.3×	0.8×	-0.4×	1.0×	0.2×	Interest coverageInt. cov.
$755M	$674M	$717M	$981M	$364M	$532M	$296M	$318M	$153M	$155M	$142M	Shareholders’ equityEquity
0.2%	0.2%	0.2%	0.6%	0.8%	0.6%	0.6%	0.6%	0.5%	0.4%	0.4%	Stock comp / revenueSBC/rev
—	$26M	—	$62M	$362M	—	—	—	—	—	—	Goodwill written downGW imp.
											Per share
45.3M	53.0M	58.4M	67.7M	132M	135M	137M	140M	143M	146M	198M	Shares out (diluted)Shares
$27.70	$25.32	$26.13	$27.60	$25.85	$23.80	$21.51	$19.08	$17.61	$15.77	$11.54	Revenue / shareRev/sh
$0.70	$-0.02	$0.31	$-1.77	$-5.09	$-1.00	$-0.57	$-0.20	$-0.18	$0.01	$0.15	EPS (diluted)EPS
$1.86	$1.88	$1.68	$0.17	$0.16	$0.65	$-0.03	$0.40	$0.36	$0.43	$0.30	Owner earnings / shareOE/sh
$1.86	$1.88	$1.68	$0.17	$0.16	$0.65	$-0.03	$0.40	$0.36	$0.43	$0.30	Free cash flow / shareFCF/sh
$1.32	$1.43	$1.49	$1.36	$0.00	$0.00	—	—	—	—	$0.00	Dividends / shareDiv/sh
$0.23	$0.21	$0.20	$0.21	$0.28	$0.29	$0.33	$0.27	$0.35	$0.35	$0.26	Cap. spending / shareCapex/sh
$16.66	$12.72	$12.28	$14.50	$2.76	$3.95	$2.16	$2.28	$1.07	$1.06	$0.72	Book value / shareBVPS

The diluted share count moved ×1.95 into 2020 — 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

	9-yr	5-yr
Revenue / share	−6.1%/yr	−9.4%/yr
Owner earnings / share	−15.0%/yr	+22.2%/yr
EPS	−36.3%/yr	—
Capital spending / share	+4.6%/yr	+4.7%/yr
Book value / share	−26.3%/yr	−17.4%/yr

The record, charted

FY2016–2025

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

Share count

146Mpeak FY2025

ROIC

−3%low FY2020

Gross margin

39%low FY2023

Net debt ÷ owner earnings

13.7×peak FY2019

Owner earnings vs. net income

Owner earningsNet income

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

$63Mowner earningsvs.$2Mnet incomelow FY2022

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 turned $2M of profit into $63M 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$2M

Owner earnings$63M · 3% of revenue

	FY2025	FY2024	FY2023	FY2022	FY2021
Reported net income	$2M	($26M)	($28M)	($78M)	($135M)
Depreciation & amortizationnon-cash charge added back	+$166M	+$156M	+$163M	+$182M	+$204M
Stock-based compensationreal costnon-cash, but a real cost	+$9M	+$13M	+$17M	+$17M	+$18M
Working capital & othertiming of cash in and out, other non-cash items	−$62M	−$42M	−$57M	−$80M	+$40M
Cash from operations	$114M	$100M	$95M	$41M	$127M
Capital expenditurecash put back in to keep running and to grow	−$51M	−$50M	−$38M	−$45M	−$40M
Owner earnings	$63M	$51M	$56M	($5M)	$88M
Owner-earnings marginowner earnings ÷ revenue	3%	2%	2%	0%	3%

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 $9M), owner earnings is nearer $54M.

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? -0.4×

Does not cover its interest

Operating income ($43M) ÷ interest expense $97M

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? $864M

Net debt against an operating loss

Cash $90M − debt $954M

What this means
Netting $90M of cash and short-term investments against $954M of debt leaves $864M 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? 1d

Tight

DSO 35 + DIO 3 − DPO 37 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 -2%

Below average through the cycle

7-yr median, range -20%–6%; -3% latest = NOPAT ($34M) ÷ invested capital $1.0B

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 7 years (it ran -3% 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 3%

Thin, recently turned positive

latest $63M = operating cash $114M − maintenance capex $51M; positive each of the last 3 years, after an earlier loss stretch (10-yr median 2%)

Industry peers: median 7%

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 3% of revenue this year, a 2% median across 10 years. Treating stock comp as the real expense it is (less $9M of SBC) leaves $54M.
Are earnings backed by cash? 65.40×

Cash-backed

Cash from ops $114M ÷ net income $2M

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? 5%

Reinvests most of it

Dividends + buybacks $3M ÷ Owner Earnings $63M

What this means
Of $63M Owner Earnings, $3M (5%) went back to shareholders, $0 dividends, $3M buybacks. But the buybacks barely exceed stock issued to employees ($9M SBC), net of dilution, little was truly returned. 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? 0.31×

Harvesting

Capex $51M ÷ depreciation $166M

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 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 · $2.3B

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× · 0.75×

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 · $954M vs ($129M) 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 Miss

A profit every year (10-yr record) · 7 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 · 4 of 10 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 Miss

Earnings +33% over the record · −207%

What this means
At least a third more earnings than a decade ago, averaging three years at each end. Net income (not per-share), so stock splits don't distort it, buybacks and dilution show up in the share-count line instead.
Moderate price —

P/E ≤ 15 and P/E × P/B ≤ 22.5 · decided by the price

What this means
Graham's valuation gate, the wall he kept between a sound business and a sound investment. Three-year average earnings are $-0.12/share (latest year $0.01), the averaged base the calculator's gate runs on, and book value is $1.06/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 3 of 10

What this means
Lost money in 7 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 4% → 2% (3-yr avg ends)

In the filing’s words The filing attributes gains to higher prices, but the margin in the record has not followed — the claim outruns the result here.

What this means
The recent-years average (2%) sits below the early years (4%), but the latest year (4%) is back near the early level: a cyclical trough dragging the window down, not a one-way slide. The through-cycle median is 3% — read it across the cycle, not on the dip.
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 −5%/yr

What this means
Owner earnings shrank about 5% a year over the record.
Worst year 2020 · −13.2% op. margin

What this means
Operations went underwater in 2020, understand why before trusting the good years.
Dividend record rising

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

Does AI threaten the moat?

Elevated contestability

The 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 Named as a competitive risk

Its FY2025 10-K names artificial intelligence as a competitive threat.

“In addition, the competitive landscape may shift if other industry players adopt AI more swiftly.”

The product is the kind capable AI most directly contests: when a substitute can be built cheaply, the incumbent's pricing power is the first thing at risk. The record cannot say whether the moat outlasts that; past durability is a starting point, not a promise.

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, Mar 31, 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$395M

Cash & short-term investments$85M
Receivables$227M
Inventory$11M
Other current assets$72M

Current liabilities$499M

Debt due within a year$71M
Accounts payable$142M
Other current liabilities$287M

Current ratio0.79×all current assets ÷ what's due · Graham looked for 2×

Quick ratio0.77×stricter: inventory excluded

Cash ratio0.17×strictest: cash alone against what's due

Working capital($105M)the cushion left after near-term bills

Debt due this year vs. cash$71M due · $85M cash covered by cash on hand, no refinancing forced · both figures from the Mar 31, 2026 balance sheet

Revenue, latest quarter vs. a year ago−4.0%the freshest read on whether the business is still growing

Current ratio, recent quarters0.8× → 0.8×

Deeper floors

Tangible book value($699M)equity stripped of goodwill & intangibles

Net current asset value($1.3B)Graham's net-net: current assets less all liabilities

Debt incl. operating leases$1.1B$166M of it operating leases

Deferred revenue$110Mcustomer 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$69M

'27$94M

'28$69M

'29$522M

Bars scaled to the largest single year.

Due in the next 12 months$69Mthe first rung: what must be repaid or rolled over within the year

Within two years$163Mthe near wall, the part most exposed to today’s credit conditions

Biggest single year$522Min 2029the lumpiest maturity, where a refinancing, if needed, is largest

Due over the next five years$754Mthe near slice; the balance sheet carries $954M of debt in all

Against what the business has and earns

Cash & short-term investments, Mar 31, 2026$85M

One year of owner earnings (FY2025)$63M

Together, against $69M due next year2.1×

Cash on hand as of Mar 31, 2026 plus a year’s owner earnings comes to $148M against the $69M due in the twelve months after the Dec 31, 2025 schedule: 2.1 times it.

Maturity schedule extracted from the company’s Dec 31, 2025 annual report and reconciled to the balance-sheet debt.

How the cash was used, 2016–2025

Over the record, the business generated $876M of operating cash; how management split it reads as a balanced allocator, splitting cash between the business, owners, and the balance sheet.

Reinvested$308M · 35%
Dividends$314M · 36%
Buybacks$26M · 3%
Retained (debt / cash)$227M · 26%

Returned to owners$341M
60% of the owner earnings the business produced over the span, $314M as dividends and $26M as buybacks.
Source of fundingOperating cash
Operating cash covered reinvestment and returns; over the span debt rose $613M and cash and short-term investments fell $87M.
Average price paid for buybacks—
Buybacks ran $26M over the span, but the filings don't tag the share count needed to deduce the average price paid.
Net change in share count335.8%
The diluted count rose from 45M to 198M: issuance (stock pay, deals) outran any buybacks, so owners were diluted on net.
Dividend record$0.00/sh
Paid in 4 of the years on record. 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 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$857M47% of all assets; the premium carried on the balance sheet for businesses acquired

Against book equityexceeds itgoodwill alone is larger than the company’s entire book equity; stripped of the acquisition premium, there is no net book worth

Cash spent acquiring$1.3Bover 10 years buying other businesses, against $308M of capital spent building

$450M written down across 3 years (2017, 2019, 2020): goodwill the company has already conceded it overpaid for, charged against earnings. That is roughly 34% 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 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	Pay, as filed	“Actually paid”	Owner earnings
2021	$7.7M	$12.3M	$88M
2022	$3.4M	−$4.6M	($5M)
2023	$3.9M	$2.6M	$56M
2024	$4.5M	$7.0M	$51M
2025	$4.1M	$3.3M	$63M

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 ownership4.4%
The stake all directors and executive officers hold together, per the 2026 proxy: skin in the game, the first thing Munger reads.
CEO pay ratio74:1
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$9M
The slice of the business handed to employees in shares this year, 0% 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 USA TODAY Co. 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.

4 of the 5 tests turned up something to look into; the other 1 came back clean.

Look hereIs it less profitable than it was?2.3% vs 6.8%
The owner-earnings margin averaged 6.8% early in the record and 2.3% 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 the share count rise anyway?335.8%
Diluted shares grew 335.8% over 2016–2025, even as the company spent $26M on buybacks. The repurchases were outrun by issuance — to staff, in a raise, or in a deal — and the filing says which; owners' slice still shrank. Read the buyback line beside this one, not on its own.
Look hereDid debt outgrow the business?$353M → $966M
Debt rose from $353M to $966M while owner earnings went from about $94M to $57M — about 3.8 years of owner earnings in debt then, about 17 now: measured against what the business earns, the balance sheet carries more debt than it did. Debt raised for buybacks or deals rather than growth is the kind that bites in a downturn.
Look hereAre "one-time" charges a yearly habit?9 of 10 years
Management took an impairment or write-down in 9 of the last 10 years, $520M in all. A charge taken almost every year is not one-time; it is the business — past deals coming due, and an admission the assets were worth less than what was paid. Munger's rule: when the "one-time" keeps happening, it is the business. Read it beside the goodwill the company still carries.

And these came back clean

Did receivables and inventory outpace sales?

Each test is read from the filings and is noisy alone; a flag can mark a cyclical trough or a year of heavy investment as easily as a problem. The filing says which.

What an owner would ask, FY2025

read the 10-K →

Which reported numbers are a judgment call?
Management names Revenue recognition, Pension & retirement, 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, Publishing

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
NWSNews Corporation	$8.5B	—	3.3%	2%	7%
CMPRCimpress plc Ordinary Shares (Ireland)	$3.4B	49%	4.6%	8%	7%
TDAYUSA TODAY Co. Inc.	$2.3B	40%	2.9%	-2%	2%
MHMcGraw Hill Inc.	$2.1B	—	13.2%	7%	12%
WBTNWEBTOON Entertainment Inc.	$1.4B	24%	-6.0%	-8%	0%
DJCODaily Journal Corp. (S.C.)	$88M	—	0.6%	-0%	1%
Group median	—	40%	3.1%	1%	5%

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 USA TODAY Co. Inc. has delivered.

Today’s price $

Through the cycle, USA TODAY Co. Inc. earns about $56M on its 2.4% median owner-earnings margin. This year’s 2.7% margin runs in line with that. Normalize, below, values the price on that through-cycle figure rather than the latest year.

Base Normalize · through-cycle ($56M) Net of stock comp (−$8M)

—

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+8%/yr

Owner-earnings growth · ’16→’25−5%/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.

Owner earnings $60M on 147M shares outstanding, per the 10-Q cover, as of 2026-04-27; net debt $881M. The if-converted diluted count is 198M, 35% above the shares outstanding: the dilution overhang (convertibles, options) a buyer inherits. 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. The dials set the multiple a growth belief justifies; the price, and every dollar on this page, is yours.

Weigh TDAY against another business →

The owners of TDAY: the meeting and the votes →

Cite: Owner Scorecard, "USA TODAY Co. Inc. (TDAY), the owner's record," https://ownerscorecard.com/c/TDAY, data as of 2026-07-09.

Manual order: ← TCX its page in the Manual TDC →

Industry order: ← SCHL the Publishing chapter WBTN →