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VHI, Valhi Inc.
Revenue is Chemicals (90%), Component Products (8%) and Real Estate Management and Development (3%).
The business
What it sells, where the money comes from, the kind of company it is.
The business in brief
read the 10-K →What this business is and what moves its needle, from its own SEC filings.
- What it is
- A chemicals business, converting feedstocks into products at a spread the cycle moves.
- 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 22% and operating margin about 10% through the cycle, a thin spread that turns the result on volume and the cost of what it sells far more than on the price it sets. The margin is cyclical, swinging between 1.8% and 20% 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. Inventory runs near 28% of sales, so how fast it turns back into cash — and the risk of writing it down when demand softens — sits alongside the margin. Read this kind of business on the spread and utilization. On its own account, the filing leans hardest on customer concentration, set against the numbers in what the filing emphasizes, below.
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 →The largest slice of sales is Chemicals at 90%, but the profit engine is Real Estate Management And Development: 3% of revenue and 74% of the profitable segments' operating profit. Chemicals ran a $25M operating loss.
- Chemicals90%$1.9Bloss of $25M
- Component Products8%$158M26% of profit
- Real Estate Management And Development3%$59M74% of profit
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 the profitable segments' operating profit (a loss-making segment carries its loss in dollars in the legend, not a share of the bar), before unallocated corporate costs.
The record
Ten years of arithmetic, read across the cycle.
The record, 2016–2025
realized figures from each filing · older years to the left| 2016’16 | 2017’17 | 2018’18 | 2019’19 | 2020’20 | 2021’21 | 2022’22 | 2023’23 | 2024’24 | 2025’25 | TTMTTMMar 2026 | |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Income statement | |||||||||||
| $1.5B | $1.9B | $1.8B | $1.9B | $1.8B | $2.3B | $2.2B | $1.9B | $2.1B | $2.1B | $2.1B | RevenueRevenue |
| 20% | 33% | 33% | 23% | 22% | 25% | 22% | 13% | 20% | 14% | 13% | Gross marginGross mgn |
| 15% | 14% | 17% | 16% | 15% | 14% | 14% | 14% | 12% | 15% | 15% | SG&A / revenueSG&A/rev |
| 1% | 1% | 1% | 1% | 1% | 1% | 1% | 1% | 1% | 1% | 1% | R&D / revenueR&D/rev |
| $119M | $380M | $371M | $193M | $186M | $319M | $239M | $34M | $211M | $63M | $46M | Operating incomeOp. inc. |
| 7.8% | 20.2% | 20.4% | 10.2% | 10.1% | 13.9% | 10.8% | 1.8% | 10.0% | 3.0% | 2.2% | Operating marginOp. mgn |
| ($16M) | $208M | $262M | $49M | $55M | $127M | $87M | ($10M) | $108M | ($58M) | ($73M) | Net incomeNet inc. |
| — | — | — | 35% | 22% | 32% | 30% | — | 43% | — | — | Effective tax rateTax rate |
| Cash flow & returns | |||||||||||
| $80M | $259M | $166M | $177M | $152M | $460M | $35M | $4M | $44M | ($36M) | $74M | Operating cash flowOp. cash |
| $68M | $59M | $58M | $57M | $69M | $59M | $59M | $54M | $67M | $66M | $68M | DepreciationDeprec. |
| $28M | ($7M) | ($155M) | $71M | $29M | $273M | ($111M) | ($40M) | ($131M) | ($44M) | $79M | Working capital & otherWC & other |
| $59M | $71M | $61M | $60M | $66M | $64M | $68M | $49M | $31M | $47M | $44M | CapexCapex |
| 3.9% | 3.8% | 3.4% | 3.2% | 3.5% | 2.8% | 3.0% | 2.5% | 1.5% | 2.2% | 2.1% | Capex / revenueCapex/rev |
| $21M | $188M | $104M | $117M | $87M | $396M | ($33M) | ($45M) | $13M | ($82M) | $30M | Owner earningsOwner earn. |
| 1.4% | 10.0% | 5.7% | 6.2% | 4.7% | 17.2% | −1.5% | −2.3% | 0.6% | −4.0% | 1.4% | Owner earnings marginOE mgn |
| $21M | $188M | $104M | $117M | $87M | $396M | ($33M) | ($45M) | $13M | ($82M) | $30M | Free cash flowFCF |
| 1.4% | 10.0% | 5.7% | 6.2% | 4.7% | 17.2% | −1.5% | −2.3% | 0.6% | −4.0% | 1.4% | Free cash flow marginFCF mgn |
| $27M | $27M | $27M | $27M | $14M | $9M | $9M | $9M | $9M | $9M | $9M | Dividends paidDiv. paid |
| — | — | — | $3M | $1M | $2M | $4M | $3M | — | — | — | BuybacksBuybacks |
| -8% | 49% | 41% | 8% | 8% | 15% | 9% | -1% | 10% | -6% | -7% | Return on equityROE |
| −21% | 42% | 37% | 3% | 6% | 14% | 8% | −2% | 10% | −7% | −8% | Retained to equityRetained/eq |
| Balance sheet | |||||||||||
| $418M | $694M | $507M | $532M | $526M | $704M | $555M | $468M | $356M | $223M | $202M | Cash & investmentsCash+inv |
| $359M | $398M | $516M | $522M | $538M | $459M | $641M | $596M | $686M | $660M | $580M | InventoryInvent. |
| $93M | $116M | $112M | $145M | $118M | $153M | $199M | $229M | $250M | $231M | $209M | Accounts payablePayables |
| $266M | $282M | $404M | $377M | $421M | $306M | $441M | $368M | $436M | $429M | $642M | Operating working capitalOper. WC |
| $837M | $1.3B | $1.4B | $1.4B | $1.5B | $1.7B | $1.6B | $1.5B | $1.5B | $1.3B | $1.3B | Current assetsCur. assets |
| $294M | $331M | $351M | $323M | $318M | $464M | $493M | $507M | $644M | $449M | $386M | Current liabilitiesCur. liab. |
| 2.8× | 3.8× | 4.0× | 4.4× | 4.6× | 3.6× | 3.2× | 2.9× | 2.3× | 2.8× | 3.2× | Current ratioCurr. ratio |
| $380M | $380M | $380M | $380M | $380M | $380M | $380M | $380M | $382M | $382M | $382M | GoodwillGoodwill |
| $2.4B | $2.9B | $2.7B | $2.8B | $2.9B | $3.0B | $2.8B | $2.7B | $2.8B | $2.6B | $2.6B | Total assetsAssets |
| $894M | $1.0B | $800M | $794M | $789M | $653M | $560M | $547M | $563M | $592M | $838M | Total debtDebt |
| $476M | $349M | $293M | $262M | $263M | ($51M) | $5M | $79M | $208M | $369M | $637M | Net debt / (cash)Net debt |
| 2.1× | 6.5× | 6.7× | 4.7× | 5.1× | 9.8× | 8.6× | 1.2× | 4.2× | 1.1× | 0.8× | Interest coverageInt. cov. |
| $201M | $424M | $635M | $640M | $683M | $830M | $959M | $951M | $1.0B | $1.0B | $1.0B | Shareholders’ equityEquity |
| Per share | |||||||||||
| 342M | 342M | 28.5M | 28.5M | 28.5M | 28.5M | 28.5M | 28.5M | 28.5M | 28.5M | 28.5M | Shares out (diluted)Shares |
| $4.44 | $5.50 | $63.86 | $66.58 | $64.90 | $80.58 | $77.98 | $67.43 | $73.85 | $72.88 | $73.63 | Revenue / shareRev/sh |
| $-0.05 | $0.61 | $9.20 | $1.73 | $1.94 | $4.46 | $3.06 | $-0.35 | $3.79 | $-2.02 | $-2.54 | EPS (diluted)EPS |
| $0.06 | $0.55 | $3.65 | $4.12 | $3.04 | $13.88 | $-1.15 | $-1.56 | $0.46 | $-2.88 | $1.05 | Owner earnings / shareOE/sh |
| $0.06 | $0.55 | $3.65 | $4.12 | $3.04 | $13.88 | $-1.15 | $-1.56 | $0.46 | $-2.88 | $1.05 | Free cash flow / shareFCF/sh |
| $0.08 | $0.08 | $0.95 | $0.95 | $0.48 | $0.32 | $0.32 | $0.32 | $0.32 | $0.32 | $0.32 | Dividends / shareDiv/sh |
| $0.17 | $0.21 | $2.15 | $2.10 | $2.30 | $2.25 | $2.37 | $1.70 | $1.08 | $1.64 | $1.56 | Cap. spending / shareCapex/sh |
| $0.59 | $1.24 | $22.29 | $22.46 | $23.95 | $29.11 | $33.64 | $33.35 | $36.35 | $35.90 | $35.99 | Book value / shareBVPS |
The diluted share count moved ×1/12 into 2018 — shares retired, not a split the totals corroborate — and the per-share figures carry the counts as filed.
| 9-yr | 5-yr | |
|---|---|---|
| Revenue / share | +36.5%/yr | +2.3%/yr |
| Dividends / share | +16.7%/yr | −7.7%/yr |
| Capital spending / share | +28.4%/yr | −6.6%/yr |
| Book value / share | +57.9%/yr | +8.4%/yr |
The record, charted
FY2016–2025Each measure over its full record; the current point and the worst year marked.
Owner earnings vs. net income
Owner earningsNet incomeThe accountant's number, and the cash an owner can take; the gap is the tell.
Where the cash went
ReinvestBuybacksDividendsAcquisitionsRetainedBeyond op. cashEach 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.
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 a $58M loss but ($82M) of owner earnings: $25M less than the profit line, taken out by capital spending and the timing of cash.
| FY2025 | FY2024 | FY2023 | FY2022 | FY2021 | |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Reported net income | ($58M) | $108M | ($10M) | $87M | $127M |
| Depreciation & amortizationnon-cash charge added back | +$66M | +$67M | +$54M | +$59M | +$59M |
| Working capital & othertiming of cash in and out, other non-cash items | −$44M | −$131M | −$40M | −$111M | +$273M |
| Cash from operations | ($36M) | $44M | $4M | $35M | $460M |
| Capital expenditurecash put back in to keep running and to grow | −$47M | −$31M | −$49M | −$68M | −$64M |
| Owner earnings | ($82M) | $13M | ($45M) | ($33M) | $396M |
| Owner-earnings marginowner earnings ÷ revenue | -4% | 1% | -2% | -1% | 17% |
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 .
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.
Quality & stewardship
Returns, the balance sheet, capital allocation, and pay.
Owner’s Scorecard
Will it survive?
- ThinOperating income $63M ÷ interest expense $57M
What this means
Operating profit covers interest, but with little room. A bad year, a refinancing at higher rates, or a revenue wobble closes the gap fast.
- How heavy is the debt, net of cash? $375M · 5.9× operating profitHeavy net debtCash $214M + ST investments $3M − debt $592M
What this means
Netting $217M of cash and short-term investments against $592M of debt leaves $375M owed, about 5.9× a year's operating profit (9.3× on the gross debt, before the cash). It also holds $6M in longer-dated marketable securities; counting those, it sits at $369M of net debt. Net debt is the leverage figure that matters: the cash is already set against the debt. Strategic or illiquid investments aren't counted here.
- Long (60+ days)DSO 48 + DIO 135 − DPO 47 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?
- Not enough dataIndustry peers: median 9%
What this means
The filing data didn't include the inputs for this check.
- Thin through the cycle10-yr median margin, range -4%–17%; latest ($82M) = operating cash ($36M) − maintenance capex $47MIndustry peers: median 6%
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 -4% of revenue this year, a 1% median across 10 years.
- Are earnings backed by cash? ($36M)Loss, and burning cashNet income ($58M) · cash from operations ($36M)
What this means
The company reported a net loss, so a conversion ratio isn't meaningful. What matters then is whether operations still threw off cash, here, they did not.
How is the cash used?
- No surplus to allocate
What this means
The business didn't generate positive Owner Earnings this year, so any distributions came from the balance sheet or borrowing, not from operations.
- Investing or harvesting? 0.70×HarvestingCapex $47M ÷ depreciation $66M
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 · 4 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 PassRevenue ≥ $2B · $2.1B
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 PassCurrent ratio ≥ 2× · 2.80×
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 PassDebt ≤ working capital · $592M vs $810M 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 MissA profit every year (10-yr record) · 3 loss years
What this means
Graham wanted earnings in each of the past ten years, the stability a defensive owner leans on.
- Dividend record PassUninterrupted 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 MissEarnings +33% over the record · −91%
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 $0.48/share (latest year $-2.04), the averaged base the calculator's gate runs on, and book value is $36.15/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 7 of 10
What this means
Lost money in 3 year(s), look at what happened there before trusting the average.
- Return on capital ≥ 15% 5 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 16% → 5% (3-yr avg ends)
In the filing’s words The filing attributes gains to higher prices but names price competition too — and the margin slipped, so the pressure is winning here.
What this means
Through the cycle the operating margin slipped — about 16% early to 5% lately, median 10% — competition or costs are biting in.
- 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.
- Worst year 2023 · 1.8% op. margin
What this means
Stayed profitable even in its hardest year, the resilience that survives recessions.
- Dividend record paid
What this means
Paid a dividend in 10 of the years on record.
Does AI threaten the moat?
Low contestabilityThe 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.
Current Position
as of the latest quarter, Mar 31, 2026Can 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.
- Cash & short-term investments$196M
- Receivables$271M
- Inventory$580M
- Other current assets$206M
- Debt due within a year$35M
- Accounts payable$209M
- Other current liabilities$142M
From the company's latest filing.
How the cash was used, 2016–2025
Over the record, the business generated $1.3B of operating cash; how management split it reads as a balanced allocator, splitting cash between the business, owners, and the balance sheet.
- Reinvested$575M · 43%
- Dividends$167M · 12%
- Buybacks$13M · 1%
- Retained (debt / cash)$586M · 44%
- Returned to owners$180M
23% of the owner earnings the business produced over the span, $167M as dividends and $13M as buybacks.
- Average price paid for buybacks—
Buybacks ran $13M over the span, but the filings don't tag the share count needed to deduce the average price paid.
- Net change in share count−91.7%
The diluted count fell from 342M to 29M, so the buybacks outran the stock issued to staff.
- Dividend record$0.32/sh
Paid in 10 of the years on record, the per-share dividend growing about 17% a year. It was cut at least once along the way.
- Return on what it retained−22%
Of the earnings it kept rather than paid out ($633M over the span), annual owner earnings (first three years vs last three) fell $142M, so each retained $1 gave back about 0.22 of yearly owner earnings. Buffett's test, run on owner earnings instead of market value.
Buybacks are gross of stock issued to staff; the share-count line above is the net of that, the figure that decides whether owners gained. The average price paid blends a year of purchases (and any accelerated repurchase), so it is close, not exact. The record of where the cash went and on what terms.
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 | Michael S. Simmons | $7.4M | $7.4M | $396M |
| 2022 | Michael S. Simmons | $9.0M | $9.0M | ($33M) |
| 2023 | Michael S. Simmons | $2.1M | $2.1M | ($45M) |
| 2024 | Michael S. Simmons | $2.5M | $2.5M | $13M |
| 2025 | Michael S. Simmons | $3.7M | $3.7M | ($82M) |
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 2026 proxy: skin in the game, the first thing Munger reads.
- CEO pay ratio48:1
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.
Inverting the record
Invert: instead of why Valhi 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.
1 of the 6 tests turned up something to look into; the other 5 came back clean.
- Look hereIs it less profitable than it was?−1.9% vs 5.7%
The owner-earnings margin averaged 5.7% early in the record and −1.9% 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.
- Did the share count rise anyway?
- Did debt outgrow the business?
- Did reported profit become cash?
- Did receivables and inventory outpace sales?
- Are "one-time" charges a yearly habit?
Each test is read from the filings and is noisy alone; a flag can mark a cyclical trough or a year of heavy investment as easily as a problem. The filing says which.
What an owner would ask, FY2025
read the 10-K →- Which reported numbers are a judgment call?Management names Pension & retirement, Income taxes, Acquisitions 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, Industrial Gases
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 |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| TROXTronox Holdings | $2.9B | 23% | 7.7% | 3% | 4% |
| ESIElement Solutions Inc. | $2.6B | 42% | 12.6% | 5% | 9% |
| VHIValhi Inc. | $2.1B | 22% | 10.1% | — | 3% |
| MTXMinerals Technologies Inc. | $2.1B | 25% | 12.2% | 9% | 7% |
| HXLHexcel | $1.9B | 24% | 11.6% | 11% | 9% |
| KROKronos Worldwide Inc | $1.9B | 21% | 7.7% | 11% | 3% |
| IOSPInnospec | $1.8B | 30% | 9.3% | 10% | 6% |
| LXULSB Industries Inc. | $615M | 5% | -2.7% | -1% | -3% |
| Group median | — | 24% | 9.7% | — | 5% |
The price
What a price has to assume.
What the price implies
reverse-DCFType today's close and see the owner-earnings growth you'd have to believe to justify it, beside what Valhi Inc. has delivered.
Through the cycle, Valhi Inc. earns about $63M on its 3.0% median owner-earnings margin. This year’s −4.0% 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.
—
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.
A dated snapshot of the price you typed, the assumptions you set, and what the page showed for them. A snapshot is never edited after it is saved. Your notebook is yours alone — the commitment states what is stored and what we will never do.
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.
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 $30M on 28M shares outstanding, per the 10-Q cover, as of 2026-05-01; net debt $637M. 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.
Manual order: ← VG its page in the Manual VIA →
Industry order: ← TROX the Industrial Gases chapter