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WHR, Whirlpool

Household Durables capital-intensive Cyclical

Whirlpool manufactures products in four countries and markets products in nearly every country around the world.

As of December 31, 2025, the operations previously reported within the MDA Asia segment are no longer reported as a segment as a result of the deconsolidation of Whirlpool India.

Prior period segment information has been recast to retrospectively reflect this change.

Latest annual: FY2025 10-K

WHR · Whirlpool

The business

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

Revenue · FY2025

$15.5B

−6.5% YoY · −4% 5-yr CAGR

Vital signs · TTM, with 5-yr average

Revenue $15.2B 5-yr avg $18.7B

Gross margin 14% 5-yr avg 17%

Operating margin 4.4% 5-yr avg 3.4%

ROIC 4% 5-yr avg 8%

Owner-earnings margin −0% 5-yr avg 3%

Free cash flow margin −0% 5-yr avg 3%

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: Revenue is led by Refrigeration (31%) and Laundry (28%), with 4 more lines behind.
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 17% and operating margin about 5.3% 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 −5.4% and 11% 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 12% of sales, so how fast it turns back into cash — and the risk of writing it down when demand softens — sits alongside the margin. 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 sat near the cost of capital (median 12%). 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.

Where the money comes from

read the 10-K →

Revenue spreads across 6 lines, the largest Refrigeration at 31%.

Revenue by product line, FY2025

Refrigeration31%$4.8B
Laundry28%$4.4B
Cooking24%$3.7B
Dishwashing8%$1.2B
Other6%$946M
Spare parts and warranties4%$550M

By geographyUnited States65%Brazil15%

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	TTMTTMMar 2026
											Income statement
$20.7B	$21.3B	$21.0B	$20.4B	$19.5B	$22.0B	$19.7B	$19.5B	$16.6B	$15.5B	$15.2B	RevenueRevenue
18%	17%	17%	17%	20%	20%	16%	16%	16%	15%	14%	Gross marginGross mgn
10%	10%	10%	10%	10%	9%	9%	10%	10%	11%	10%	SG&A / revenueSG&A/rev
3%	3%	3%	3%	2%	2%	2%	2%	2%	2%	2%	R&D / revenueR&D/rev
$1.4B	$1.1B	$279M	$1.5B	$1.6B	$2.3B	($1.1B)	$1.0B	$143M	$838M	$672M	Operating incomeOp. inc.
6.6%	5.3%	1.3%	7.6%	8.3%	10.7%	−5.4%	5.2%	0.9%	5.4%	4.4%	Operating marginOp. mgn
$888M	$350M	($183M)	$1.2B	$1.1B	$1.8B	($1.5B)	$481M	($323M)	$318M	$165M	Net incomeNet inc.
17%	—	—	23%	26%	23%	—	14%	—	31%	41%	Effective tax rateTax rate
											Cash flow & returns
$1.2B	$1.3B	$1.2B	$1.2B	$1.5B	$2.2B	$1.4B	$915M	$835M	$470M	$364M	Operating cash flowOp. cash
$655M	$654M	$645M	$587M	$568M	$494M	$475M	$361M	$333M	$338M	$354M	DepreciationDeprec.
($340M)	$260M	$767M	($525M)	($143M)	($101M)	$2.4B	$39M	$734M	($323M)	($258M)	Working capital & otherWC & other
$660M	$684M	$590M	$532M	$410M	$525M	$570M	$549M	$451M	$389M	$385M	CapexCapex
3.2%	3.2%	2.8%	2.6%	2.1%	2.4%	2.9%	2.8%	2.7%	2.5%	2.5%	Capex / revenueCapex/rev
$543M	$580M	$639M	$698M	$1.1B	$1.7B	$820M	$366M	$384M	$81M	($21M)	Owner earningsOwner earn.
2.6%	2.7%	3.0%	3.4%	5.6%	7.5%	4.2%	1.9%	2.3%	0.5%	−0.1%	Owner earnings marginOE mgn
$543M	$580M	$639M	$698M	$1.1B	$1.7B	$820M	$366M	$384M	$81M	($21M)	Free cash flowFCF
2.6%	2.7%	3.0%	3.4%	5.6%	7.5%	4.2%	1.9%	2.3%	0.5%	−0.1%	Free cash flow marginFCF mgn
$12M	$35M	$25M	$0	$0	$46M	$3.0B	$14M	$0	$0	$0	AcquisitionsAcquis.
$294M	$312M	$306M	$305M	$311M	$338M	$390M	$384M	$384M	$300M	$261M	Dividends paidDiv. paid
$525M	$750M	$1.2B	$148M	$121M	$1.0B	$903M	$0	$50M	$0	—	BuybacksBuybacks
14%	7%	—	20%	19%	26%	-10%	11%	—	7%	4%	ROICROIC
19%	8%	-8%	37%	28%	37%	-65%	20%	-12%	12%	4%	Return on equityROE
12%	1%	−21%	27%	20%	30%	−82%	4%	−26%	1%	−3%	Retained to equityRetained/eq
											Balance sheet
$1.1B	$1.2B	$1.5B	$2.0B	$2.9B	$3.0B	$2.0B	$1.6B	$1.3B	$669M	$626M	Cash & investmentsCash+inv
$2.7B	$2.7B	$2.2B	$2.2B	$3.1B	$3.1B	$1.6B	$1.5B	$1.3B	$1.3B	$1.2B	ReceivablesReceiv.
$2.6B	$3.0B	$2.5B	$2.4B	$2.3B	$2.7B	$2.1B	$2.2B	$2.0B	$2.3B	$2.2B	InventoryInvent.
$4.4B	$4.8B	$4.5B	$4.5B	$4.8B	$5.4B	$3.4B	$3.6B	$3.5B	$3.7B	$3.3B	Accounts payablePayables
$918M	$856M	$256M	$89M	$576M	$404M	$268M	$178M	($178M)	($121M)	$147M	Operating working capitalOper. WC
$7.3B	$7.9B	$7.9B	$7.4B	$9.1B	$9.7B	$6.4B	$6.2B	$5.2B	$4.9B	$5.0B	Current assetsCur. assets
$7.7B	$8.5B	$9.7B	$8.4B	$8.3B	$8.5B	$5.9B	$6.9B	$7.3B	$6.5B	$5.7B	Current liabilitiesCur. liab.
1.0×	0.9×	0.8×	0.9×	1.1×	1.1×	1.1×	0.9×	0.7×	0.8×	0.9×	Current ratioCurr. ratio
$3.0B	$3.1B	$2.5B	$2.4B	$2.5B	$2.5B	$3.3B	$3.3B	$3.3B	$3.1B	$3.1B	GoodwillGoodwill
$19.2B	$20.0B	$18.3B	$19.0B	$20.4B	$20.3B	$17.1B	$17.3B	$16.3B	$16.0B	$16.2B	Total assetsAssets
$4.4B	$4.8B	$5.0B	$4.7B	$5.4B	$5.2B	$7.6B	$7.2B	$6.6B	$6.2B	$6.1B	Total debtDebt
$3.4B	$3.6B	$3.5B	$2.7B	$2.4B	$2.2B	$5.7B	$5.6B	$5.3B	$5.5B	$5.5B	Net debt / (cash)Net debt
8.5×	7.0×	1.5×	8.3×	8.5×	13.4×	-5.6×	2.9×	0.4×	2.5×	2.0×	Interest coverageInt. cov.
$4.8B	$4.2B	$2.3B	$3.2B	$3.9B	$4.8B	$2.3B	$2.4B	$2.7B	$2.7B	$3.8B	Shareholders’ equityEquity
—	—	—	—	—	—	—	0.2%	0.5%	0.9%	0.7%	Stock comp / revenueSBC/rev
—	—	$579M	—	—	—	$278M	—	—	$106M	$106M	Goodwill written downGW imp.
											Per share
77.2M	74.4M	67.2M	64.2M	63.3M	62.9M	55.9M	55.2M	55.1M	56.2M	59.6M	Shares out (diluted)Shares
$268.37	$285.66	$313.05	$318.05	$307.36	$349.52	$352.84	$352.45	$301.40	$276.23	$254.63	Revenue / shareRev/sh
$11.50	$4.70	$-2.72	$18.19	$16.98	$28.35	$-27.17	$8.71	$-5.86	$5.66	$2.77	EPS (diluted)EPS
$7.03	$7.80	$9.51	$10.87	$17.22	$26.25	$14.67	$6.63	$6.97	$1.44	$-0.35	Owner earnings / shareOE/sh
$7.03	$7.80	$9.51	$10.87	$17.22	$26.25	$14.67	$6.63	$6.97	$1.44	$-0.35	Free cash flow / shareFCF/sh
$3.81	$4.19	$4.55	$4.75	$4.91	$5.37	$6.98	$6.96	$6.97	$5.34	$4.38	Dividends / shareDiv/sh
$8.55	$9.19	$8.78	$8.29	$6.48	$8.35	$10.20	$9.95	$8.19	$6.92	$6.46	Cap. spending / shareCapex/sh
$61.83	$56.42	$34.09	$49.77	$61.37	$77.04	$41.79	$42.79	$48.69	$48.51	$63.47	Book value / shareBVPS

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

	9-yr	5-yr
Revenue / share	+0.3%/yr	−2.1%/yr
Owner earnings / share	−16.1%/yr	−39.1%/yr
EPS	−7.6%/yr	−19.7%/yr
Dividends / share	+3.8%/yr	+1.7%/yr
Capital spending / share	−2.3%/yr	+1.3%/yr
Book value / share	−2.7%/yr	−4.6%/yr

The record, charted

FY2016–2025

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

Share count

56Mpeak FY2016

ROIC

7%low FY2022

Gross margin

15%low FY2025

Net debt ÷ owner earnings

67.9×peak FY2025

Owner earnings vs. net income

Owner earningsNet income

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

$81Mowner earningsvs.$318Mnet incomelow FY2025

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 $318M of profit but $81M of owner earnings: $237M less than the profit line, taken out by capital spending and the timing of cash.

Reported net income$318M

Owner earnings$81M · 1% of revenue

	FY2025	FY2024	FY2023	FY2022	FY2021
Reported net income	$318M	($323M)	$481M	($1.5B)	$1.8B
Depreciation & amortizationnon-cash charge added back	+$338M	+$333M	+$361M	+$475M	+$494M
Stock-based compensationreal costnon-cash, but a real cost	+$137M	+$91M	+$34M	—	—
Working capital & othertiming of cash in and out, other non-cash items	−$323M	+$734M	+$39M	+$2.4B	−$101M
Cash from operations	$470M	$835M	$915M	$1.4B	$2.2B
Capital expenditurecash put back in to keep running and to grow	−$389M	−$451M	−$549M	−$570M	−$525M
Owner earnings	$81M	$384M	$366M	$820M	$1.7B
Owner-earnings marginowner earnings ÷ revenue	1%	2%	2%	4%	8%

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 $137M), owner earnings is nearer ($56M).

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? 2.5×

Adequate

Operating income $838M ÷ interest expense $341M

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? $5.5B · 6.6× operating profit

Heavy net debt

Cash $669M − debt $6.2B

What this means
Netting $669M of cash and short-term investments against $6.2B of debt leaves $5.5B owed, about 6.6× a year's operating profit (7.4× 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? -9d

Negative, funded by others

DSO 30 + DIO 64 − DPO 103 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?

Return on invested capital 11%

Solid through the cycle

8-yr median, range -10%–26%; 7% latest = NOPAT $579M ÷ invested capital $8.2B

Industry peers: median 29%

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 8 years (it ran 7% 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 through the cycle

10-yr median margin, range 1%–8%; latest $81M = operating cash $470M − maintenance capex $389M

Industry peers: median 13%

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 1% of revenue this year, a 3% median across 10 years. Treating stock comp as the real expense it is (less $137M of SBC) leaves ($56M).
Are earnings backed by cash? 1.48×

Cash-backed

Cash from ops $470M ÷ net income $318M

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? 370%

Returned more than it generated

Dividends + buybacks $300M ÷ Owner Earnings $81M

What this means
The company returned more than it generated: against $81M of Owner Earnings, $300M (370%) went back to shareholders, $300M dividends, $0 buybacks — the excess came from the balance sheet or borrowing, not the year's operations. Sustained, that pattern draws down cash or adds debt; the net-debt line above shows where it stands.
Investing or harvesting? 1.15×

Maintaining

Capex $389M ÷ depreciation $338M

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 · $15.5B

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× · 0.76×

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 · $6.2B vs ($1.6B) 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) · 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 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 · −55%

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 $2.45/share (latest year $4.91), the averaged base the calculator's gate runs on, and book value is $42.05/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% 3 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% → 4% (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
Through the cycle the operating margin held roughly steady — about 4% early, 4% lately, median 5%.
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 −9%/yr

What this means
Owner earnings shrank about 9% a year over the record.
Worst year 2022 · −5.4% op. margin

What this means
Operations went underwater in 2022, understand why before trusting the good years.
Share count −3.5%/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 Named as a competitive risk

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

“In addition, the adoption of AI technologies may bring challenges in terms of disruption to both our business model and our existing technology and products.”

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, 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$5.0B

Cash & short-term investments$626M
Receivables$1.2B
Inventory$2.2B
Other current assets$944M

Current liabilities$5.7B

Debt due within a year$577M
Accounts payable$3.3B
Other current liabilities$1.8B

Current ratio0.88×all current assets ÷ what's due · Graham looked for 2×

Quick ratio0.48×stricter: inventory excluded

Cash ratio0.11×strictest: cash alone against what's due

Working capital($690M)the cushion left after near-term bills

Its current ratio is below 1, which usually reads as strain; here it is likely structural strength. This business collects from customers before it pays suppliers (a negative cash-conversion cycle), so the balance sheet is funded by that float, the way Costco's and Amazon's are. The low ratio can be the edge, not the risk; the cash-conversion cycle and the debt due above say which.

Debt due this year vs. cash$577M due · $626M 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−9.6%the freshest read on whether the business is still growing

Current ratio, recent quarters1.0× → 0.9×

Deeper floors

Tangible book value($1.9B)equity stripped of goodwill & intangibles

Debt incl. operating leases$6.8B$651M of it operating leases; with finance leases, “total fixed claims” below reaches $7.0B (annual-report basis)

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$586M

'27$702M

'28$585M

'29$695M

'30$592M

later$3.0B

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$586Mthe first rung: what must be repaid or rolled over within the year

Within two years$1.3Bthe near wall, the part most exposed to today’s credit conditions

Biggest single year$702Min 2027the lumpiest maturity, where a refinancing, if needed, is largest

Total scheduled principal$6.2Bevery year plus what lies beyond, as the footnote totals it

Against what the business has and earns

Cash & short-term investments, Mar 31, 2026$626M

One year of owner earnings (FY2025)$81M

Together, against $586M due next year1.2×

Cash on hand as of Mar 31, 2026 plus a year’s owner earnings comes to $707M against the $586M due in the twelve months after the Dec 31, 2025 schedule: 1.2 times it.

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

Lease obligations

the lease note, SEC EDGAR →

Debt by another name. What the business owes on the property, aircraft, stores and equipment it rents rather than owns is a fixed claim due on a schedule; added back to the debt, it is the true leverage. That ladder, and what it adds to the debt on the page above.

'26$214M

'27$192M

'28$158M

'29$132M

'30$105M

later$197M

Lease payments by year, scaled to the largest; “later” is everything beyond year five, shown apart. These are the contractual cash payments, before the interest the filing imputes back out to the balance-sheet liability.

Due in the next 12 months$214Ma fixed cash payment, owed whether or not the business has a good year

Total lease payments$999Mevery year plus the tail, undiscounted: the full cash the leases will take

On the balance sheet$836Mthe present value of those payments, the recognised lease liability

True leverage: debt plus leases

On-balance-sheet debt$6.2B

Lease obligations (present value)$836M

Total fixed claims on the business$7.0B

Counting the leases the way Buffett does, the fixed claims on this business come to $7.0B, of which the leases are 12%. The lease wall above and the debt schedule together are the calendar of what must be paid, and when.

Lease ladder read from the ASC 842 tags in the company’s Dec 31, 2025 annual report and reconciled: the yearly buckets sum to the undiscounted total, which less the imputed interest equals the balance-sheet liability; a ladder that doesn’t tie out is withheld.

How the cash was used, 2016–2025

Over the record, the business generated $12.2B of operating cash; how management split it reads as a cash returner, paying most of what it earns straight back to owners.

Reinvested$5.4B · 44%
Dividends$3.3B · 27%
Buybacks$4.7B · 38%

Returned to owners$8.0B
117% of the owner earnings the business produced over the span, $3.3B as dividends and $4.7B as buybacks.
Source of funding−$1.2B
Reinvestment and shareholder returns ran $1.2B beyond the operating cash the business generated, so the gap was financed off the balance sheet: debt rose from $4.4B to $6.1B, and cash and short-term investments drew down $459M.
Average price paid for buybacks—
Buybacks ran $4.7B over the span, but a stock split in the window left the reported buyback-share counts on a basis the diluted-share count doesn't match, so a comparable average price can't be drawn.
Net change in share count−22.8%
The diluted count fell from 77M to 60M, so the buybacks outran the stock issued to staff.
Dividend record$5.34/sh
Paid in 10 of the years on record, the per-share dividend growing about 4% a year. It was cut at least once along the way.

Buybacks are gross of stock issued to staff; the share-count line above is the net of that, the figure that decides whether owners gained. The average price paid blends a year of purchases (and any accelerated repurchase), so it is close, not exact. The record of where the cash went and on what terms.

Acquisitions & goodwill

from the balance sheet & the 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$5.7B35% 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$3.1Bover 10 years buying other businesses, against $5.4B of capital spent building

$963M written down across 3 years (2018, 2022, 2025): goodwill the company has already conceded it overpaid for, charged against earnings. That is roughly 31% 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	Chief executive	Pay, as filed	“Actually paid”	Owner earnings
2021	Mr. Bitzer	$18.8M	$42.5M	$1.7B
2022	Mr. Bitzer	$11.9M	−$19.3M	$820M
2023	Mr. Bitzer	$13.5M	$4.3M	$366M
2024	Mr. Bitzer	$13.9M	$12.8M	$384M
2025	Mr. Bitzer	$12.8M	$3.1M	$81M

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 ownership2%
The stake all directors and executive officers hold together, per the 2026 proxy: skin in the game, the first thing Munger reads.
Stock-based compensation$137M
The slice of the business handed to employees in shares this year, 1% of revenue, equal to 16% 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 Whirlpool 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?1.6% vs 2.8%
The owner-earnings margin averaged 2.8% early in the record and 1.6% 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 debt outgrow the business?$4.4B → $6.1B
Debt rose from $4.4B to $6.1B while owner earnings went from about $587M to $277M — about 7.6 years of owner earnings in debt then, about 22 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.

And these came back clean

Did the share count rise anyway?
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, Contingencies 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, Household Durables

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
GEVGE Vernova Inc.	$38.1B	16%	-0.7%	-3%	3%
EMREmerson Electric Company	$18.0B	43%	15.3%	17%	14%
TXNTexas Instruments Incorporated	$17.7B	64%	40.7%	35%	35%
WHRWhirlpool	$15.5B	17%	5.4%	12%	3%
OTISOtis Worldwide Corporation Common Stock	$14.4B	—	14.5%	122%	10%
MSIMotorola Solutions Inc.	$11.7B	49%	20.1%	36%	18%
SNSharkNinja Inc.	$6.4B	48%	11.7%	21%	6%
AOSA.O. Smith Corporation	$3.8B	39%	19.1%	29%	13%
Group median	—	43%	14.9%	25%	12%

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 Whirlpool has delivered.

Whirlpool’s latest year shows negative owner earnings, a cyclical trough. So the tool opens on the through-cycle base, the cash it would earn at rest; clear the toggle below to read the latest year exactly as reported.

Today’s price $

Through the cycle, Whirlpool earns about $448M on its 2.9% median owner-earnings margin. This year’s 0.5% 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 ($448M) Net of stock comp (−$103M)

—

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→’25−34%/yr

Owner-earnings growth · ’16→’25−9%/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 ($21M) on 65M shares outstanding, per the 10-Q cover, as of 2026-05-01; net debt $5.5B. The base opens on the through-cycle figure (the latest year sits off 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.

Weigh WHR against another business →

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

Manual order: ← WHD its page in the Manual WINA →

Industry order: ← VIOT the Household Durables chapter XMAX →