Owner Scorecard


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TIGO, Millicom International Cellular S.A.

Telecom Operators capital-intensive Distress / turnaround

We provide certain customer data below that we believe will assist investors in understanding our performance and to which we refer later in this section in discussing our results of operations.

Our results of operations are therefore dependent on both the size of our customer base and on the amount that customers spend on our services.

We measure the amount that customers spend on our services using a telecommunications industry metric known as ARPU, or average revenue per user per month.

Latest annual: FY2025 20-F
TIGO · Millicom International Cellular S.A.
I

The business

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

Revenue · FY2025
$5.8B
+0.3% YoY · 9% 5-yr CAGR
Vital signs · TTM, with 5-yr average
Revenue $5.8B 5-yr avg $5.4B
Gross margin 77% 5-yr avg 74%
Operating margin 28.2% 5-yr avg 19.3%
ROIC 15% 5-yr avg 7%
Owner-earnings margin 19% 5-yr avg 12%
Free cash flow margin 19% 5-yr avg 12%

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.
What moves the needle
Gross margin has run about 72% and operating margin about 15% through the cycle, a wide spread between price and the cost of what it sells — whether that advantage is durable pricing power or a margin that can erode is the question the record is for. The operating margin has swung widely — from 11% to 28% — on a steadier 72% 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. The cash cycle has run negative through the cycle (a median of −52 days): the operation is paid before it pays, so working capital releases cash as the business grows rather than tying it up. Read this kind of business on subscribers, revenue per user, and network capex. 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 5%, above 15% in 1 of 7 years). By owner earnings: roughly 5% of revenue reaches owners as cash, consistently, and customers and suppliers fund the business through negative working capital. This is price-taker territory, where the balance sheet and the cycle matter more than any multiple; the rest is in the 10-K.

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, 2016–2025

realized figures from each filing · older years to the left
2016’162017’172018’182019’192020’202021’212022’222023’232024’242025’25TTMTTMDec 2025
Income statement
$4.0B$3.9B$3.9B$4.3B$3.8B$4.3B$5.6B$5.7B$5.8B$5.8B$5.8BRevenueRevenue
71%70%72%72%72%72%73%73%76%77%77%Gross marginGross mgn
$490M$632M$640M$575M$402M$619M$915M$826M$1.3B$1.6B$1.6BOperating incomeOp. inc.
12.1%16.1%16.2%13.3%10.6%14.5%16.3%14.6%23.1%28.2%28.2%Operating marginOp. mgn
($32M)$87M($10M)$149M($344M)$590M$177M($82M)$253M$1.3B$1.3BNet incomeNet inc.
45%21%56%53%19%19%Effective tax rateTax rate
Cash flow & returns
$878M$820M$792M$801M$821M$956M$1.3B$1.2B$1.6B$1.7B$1.7BOperating cash flowOp. cash
$853M$812M$803M$1.1B$1.1B$1.1B$1.3B$1.3B$1.2B$1.3B$1.3BDepreciationDeprec.
$57M($79M)($1M)($448M)$46M($747M)($237M)($33M)$116M($862M)($926M)Working capital & otherWC & other
$719M$650M$632M$736M$622M$740M$800M$814M$540M$650M$650MCapexCapex
17.8%16.5%16.0%17.0%16.3%17.4%14.2%14.4%9.3%11.2%11.2%Capex / revenueCapex/rev
$159M$170M$160M$65M$199M$216M$484M$409M$1.1B$1.1B$1.1BOwner earningsOwner earn.
3.9%4.3%4.1%1.5%5.2%5.1%8.6%7.2%18.3%18.6%18.6%Owner earnings marginOE mgn
$159M$170M$160M$65M$199M$216M$484M$409M$1.1B$1.1B$1.1BFree cash flowFCF
3.9%4.3%4.1%1.5%5.2%5.1%8.6%7.2%18.3%18.6%18.6%Free cash flow marginFCF mgn
$265M$265M$266M$268M$0$0$0$0$0$754M$754MDividends paidDiv. paid
$0$0$10M$50M$0$5M$99M$119MBuybacksBuybacks
5%6%5%5%4%8%15%15%ROICROIC
-1%3%-0%6%-17%23%5%-2%7%36%36%Return on equityROE
−9%−6%−11%−5%−17%23%5%−2%7%15%15%Retained to equityRetained/eq
Balance sheet
$646M$619M$528M$1.5B$1.0B$895M$1.0B$775M$699M$1.6B$1.6BCash & investmentsCash+inv
$386M$339M$371M$351M$405M$379M$443M$390M$527M$527MReceivablesReceiv.
$45M$39M$32M$37M$63M$53M$45M$44M$70M$70MInventoryInvent.
$288M$282M$289M$334M$347M$400M$390M$300M$491M$491MAccounts payablePayables
$143M$96M$114M$54M$121M$32M$98M$134M$106M$106MOperating working capitalOper. WC
$599M$1.1B$1.7B$1.7B$4.1B$4.1B$4.1B$4.1B$4.3B$4.3BGoodwillGoodwill
$9.6B$9.5B$10.3B$12.9B$12.4B$15.1B$14.2B$14.5B$13.7B$17.3B$17.3BTotal assetsAssets
$3.6B$4.4B$4.2B$5.6B$7.7B$6.7B$6.7B$5.7B$6.7B$6.7BTotal debtDebt
$3.0B$3.9B$2.6B$4.6B$6.8B$5.7B$5.9B$5.0B$5.2B$5.2BNet debt / (cash)Net debt
1.3×1.6×1.7×1.0×0.7×1.3×1.5×1.2×1.9×2.3×2.3×Interest coverageInt. cov.
$3.4B$3.1B$2.5B$2.4B$2.1B$2.6B$3.6B$3.5B$3.6B$3.6B$3.6BShareholders’ equityEquity
Per share
100M100M101M101M129M129M139M171M171M168M168MShares out (diluted)Shares
$40.29$39.21$39.15$42.87$29.58$33.14$40.45$33.03$33.88$34.73$34.73Revenue / shareRev/sh
$-0.32$0.87$-0.10$1.47$-2.67$4.59$1.27$-0.48$1.48$7.85$7.85EPS (diluted)EPS
$1.58$1.69$1.59$0.64$1.55$1.68$3.48$2.39$6.21$6.47$6.47Owner earnings / shareOE/sh
$1.58$1.69$1.59$0.64$1.55$1.68$3.48$2.39$6.21$6.47$6.47Free cash flow / shareFCF/sh
$2.64$2.64$2.64$2.65$0.00$0.00$0.00$0.00$0.00$4.50$4.50Dividends / shareDiv/sh
$7.17$6.48$6.27$7.28$4.84$5.76$5.75$4.75$3.15$3.88$3.88Cap. spending / shareCapex/sh
$33.57$30.84$25.22$23.83$16.01$20.09$25.93$20.59$21.18$21.72$21.72Book value / shareBVPS
Per-share growththe realized rate an owner's share compounded
9-yr5-yr
Revenue / share−1.6%/yr+3.3%/yr
Owner earnings / share+16.9%/yr+33.1%/yr
Dividends / share+6.1%/yr
Capital spending / share−6.6%/yr−4.3%/yr
Book value / share−4.7%/yr+6.3%/yr

The record, charted

FY2016–2025

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

Share count
168Mpeak FY2023
ROIC
15%low FY2023
Gross margin
77%low FY2017
Net debt ÷ owner earnings
4.8×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.

$1.1Bowner earningsvs.$1.3Bnet incomelow FY2019

Where the cash went

ReinvestBuybacksDividendsAcquisitionsRetained

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

FY2016FY2025

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 $1.3B of profit but $1.1B of owner earnings: $232M less than the profit line, taken out by capital spending and the timing of cash.

Reported net income$1.3B
Owner earnings$1.1B · 19% of revenue
FY2025FY2024FY2023FY2022FY2021
Reported net income$1.3B$253M($82M)$177M$590M
Depreciation & amortizationnon-cash charge added back+$1.3B+$1.2B+$1.3B+$1.3B+$1.1B
Working capital & othertiming of cash in and out, other non-cash items−$862M+$116M−$33M−$237M−$747M
Cash from operations$1.7B$1.6B$1.2B$1.3B$956M
Capital expenditurecash put back in to keep running and to grow−$650M−$540M−$814M−$800M−$740M
Owner earnings$1.1B$1.1B$409M$484M$216M
Owner-earnings marginowner earnings ÷ revenue19%18%7%9%5%

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 .

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 20-F · source on SEC EDGAR →

Will it survive?

  • Adequate
    Operating income $1.6B ÷ interest expense $702M
    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? $5.2B · 3.2× operating profit
    Meaningful net debt
    Cash $1.6B − debt $6.7B
    What this means

    Netting $1.6B of cash and short-term investments against $6.7B of debt leaves $5.2B owed, about 3.2× a year's operating profit (4.1× 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.

  • Negative, funded by others
    DSO 33 + DIO 19 − DPO 137 days
    What this means

    Days cash is tied up between paying suppliers and collecting from customers. A negative cycle is a quiet moat: suppliers and customers fund the operation (Buffett's “float”), the company grows on other people's money.

Is it a good business?

  • Below average through the cycle
    7-yr median, range 4%–15%; 15% latest = NOPAT $1.3B ÷ invested capital $8.8B
    Industry peers: median 4%
    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
    10-yr median margin, range 1%–19%; latest $1.1B = operating cash $1.7B − maintenance capex $650M
    Industry peers: median 18%
    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 19% of revenue this year, a 5% median across 10 years.

  • Cash-backed
    Cash from ops $1.7B ÷ net income $1.3B
    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?

  • Returns about half
    Dividends + buybacks $873M ÷ Owner Earnings $1.1B
    What this means

    Of $1.1B Owner Earnings, $873M (81%) went back to shareholders, $754M dividends, $119M 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? 0.48×
    Harvesting
    Capex $650M ÷ depreciation $1.3B
    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 · $5.8B
    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) · 4 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 · 5 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 Pass
    Earnings +33% over the record · +3204%
    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 $2.93/share (latest year $7.79), the averaged base the calculator's gate runs on, and book value is $21.54/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 6 of 10
    What this means

    Lost money in 4 year(s), look at what happened there before trusting the average.

  • Return on capital ≥ 15% 1 of 9 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 15% → 22% (3-yr avg ends)
    What this means

    Through the cycle the operating margin widened — about 15% early to 22% lately, median 15% — pricing power intact or improving.

  • Reinvestment, incremental ROIC 17%
    What this means

    Every extra dollar the business reinvested came back at a high incremental return — the lens GBM read for a moat that reinvests rather than merely harvests. The record and the 10-K are where you check whether the rate holds.

  • Owner earnings growth +23%/yr
    What this means

    Owner earnings grew about 23% a year over the record.

  • Worst year 2020 · 10.6% op. margin
    What this means

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

  • Share count +5.9%/yr
    What this means

    The share count is rising, dilution works against you on a per-share basis.

  • Dividend record rising
    What this means

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

  • How management talks about it Owner’s terms
    What this means

    The record and the register agree: capital is compounding and the filing reasons in an owner’s terms — per-share value, return on capital, the long term — not a promoter’s.

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.

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.

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 $10.9B of operating cash; how management split it reads as a reinvestor, most operating cash is plowed back into the business.

  • Reinvested$6.9B · 63%
  • Dividends$1.8B · 17%
  • Buybacks$283M · 3%
  • Retained (debt / cash)$1.9B · 17%
  • Returned to owners$2.1B

    52% of the owner earnings the business produced over the span, $1.8B as dividends and $283M as buybacks.

  • Average price paid for buybacks

    Buybacks ran $283M over the span, but the filings don't tag the share count needed to deduce the average price paid.

  • Net change in share count67.0%

    The diluted count rose from 100M to 168M: issuance (stock pay, deals) outran any buybacks, so owners were diluted on net.

  • Dividend record$4.50/sh

    Paid in 5 of the years on record, the per-share dividend growing about 6% a year. It was cut at least once along the way.

  • Return on what it retained

    Not read here: owner earnings are negative over the span, or the company returned nearly all its earnings rather than retaining them, so there is too little retained to measure a return on.

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$12.1B70% 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$0over 10 years buying other businesses, against $6.9B of capital spent building

None written down over the record; the goodwill is still carried at full cost. That is the deals holding their value on the books so far; whether they keep doing so is the test an owner watches, since the write-down, when it comes, is the admission the price was too high.

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.

Inverting the record

Invert: instead of why Millicom International Cellular S.A. 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.

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

  • Look hereDid the share count rise anyway?67.0%

    Diluted shares grew 67.0% over 2016–2025, even as the company spent $283M 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.

And these came back clean
  • Is it less profitable than it was?
  • 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.

Peers, Telecom Operators

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
SIRISiriusXM Holdings Inc.$8.6B100%21.2%17%20%
VSNTVersant Media Group, Inc.$6.7B26.1%13%31%
TIGOMillicom International Cellular S.A.$5.8B72%15.3%5%5%
NXSTNexstar Media Group Inc.$4.9B24.3%9%22%
ROKURoku Inc.$4.7B44%-4.6%-15%5%
VSATViaSat Inc.$4.6B88%-2.7%-2%7%
FWONALiberty Media Corporation$4.5B73%13.6%4%18%
LILALiberty Latin America Ltd.$4.4B77%2.0%0%2%
Group median75%14.5%5%12%
IV

The price

What a price has to assume.

What the price implies

reverse-DCF

Enter the home-market price, not the US ADR quote. Millicom International Cellular S.A. reports in USD, and every figure here (owner earnings, book value, the share count) is on that ordinary-share basis. Enter the price on the same basis: the local-exchange quote per ordinary share. A US ADR price in dollars bundles the ADR-to-ordinary ratio, so it will not reconcile with these figures and would throw the multiple off.

Type today's close and see the owner-earnings growth you'd have to believe to justify it, beside what Millicom International Cellular S.A. has delivered.

Millicom International Cellular S.A.’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, Millicom International Cellular S.A. earns about $300M on its 5.1% median owner-earnings margin. This year’s 18.6% 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+32%/yr
Owner-earnings growth · ’16→’25+23%/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 $1.1B on 169M shares outstanding, per the 20-F cover, as of 2025-12-31; net debt $5.2B. 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. The dials set the multiple a growth belief justifies; the price, and every dollar on this page, is yours.

Cite: Owner Scorecard, "Millicom International Cellular S.A. (TIGO), the owner's record," https://ownerscorecard.com/c/TIGO, data as of 2026-07-09.

Manual order: ← THCH its page in the Manual TIGR →

Industry order: ← TEO the Telecom Operators chapter TIMB →