← All companies ← WRBY Manual WS → ← TROO Consumer Finance

WRLD, World Acceptance Corporation

World Acceptance Corporation offers an income tax return preparation and electronic filing program in all but a few of its branches.

Plans to enter into new markets through opening new branches and acquisitions as opportunities arise.

The sale of insurance products is limited to large loans in several states in which we operate.

Latest annual: FY2026 10-K

WRLD · World Acceptance Corporation

The business

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

Revenue · FY2026

$585M

+3.7% YoY · 2% 5-yr CAGR

Vital signs · TTM, with 5-yr average

Revenue $585M 5-yr avg $585M

Operating margin 7.7% 5-yr avg 12.1%

ROIC 4% 5-yr avg 6%

Owner-earnings margin 44% 5-yr avg 45%

Free cash flow margin 44% 5-yr avg 45%

The business in brief

read the 10-K →

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

Situation: Cyclical. Margins collapse and recover repeatedly across the record; a single year, good or bad, misstates the through-cycle earning power.
What moves the needle: Operating margin has run about 17% through the cycle, a solid margin the cost base and competition set as much as the price does. The operating margin has swung widely — from 4.4% to 27% over the years — so the through-cycle figure carries more than any single year, and the worst year more than the best. 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 8%). By owner earnings: roughly 44% of revenue reaches owners as cash, consistently. 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, 2017–2026

realized figures from each filing · older years to the left

2017’17	2018’18	2019’19	2020’20	2021’21	2022’22	2023’23	2024’24	2025’25	2026’26	TTMTTMMar 2026
											Income statement
$491M	$503M	$545M	$590M	$528M	$585M	$617M	$573M	$564M	$585M	$585M	RevenueRevenue
50%	54%	53%	59%	58%	51%	45%	47%	43%	52%	52%	SG&A / revenueSG&A/rev
$133M	$121M	$90M	$35M	$111M	$66M	$27M	$99M	$111M	$45M	$45M	Operating incomeOp. inc.
27.2%	24.0%	16.5%	5.9%	21.1%	11.2%	4.4%	17.3%	19.7%	7.7%	7.7%	Operating marginOp. mgn
$74M	$54M	$37M	$28M	$88M	$54M	$21M	$77M	$89M	$35M	$35M	Net incomeNet inc.
34%	47%	30%	19%	21%	18%	22%	22%	20%	24%	24%	Effective tax rateTax rate
											Cash flow & returns
$219M	$218M	$245M	$281M	$227M	$272M	$292M	$266M	$254M	$259M	$259M	Operating cash flowOp. cash
$7M	$7M	$7M	$7M	$7M	$6M	$6M	$7M	$6M	$6M	$6M	DepreciationDeprec.
$134M	$152M	$183M	$217M	$113M	$195M	$255M	$184M	$178M	$219M	$239M	Working capital & otherWC & other
$7M	$9M	$10M	$11M	$12M	$6M	$6M	$6M	$4M	$4M	$4M	CapexCapex
1.4%	1.8%	1.8%	1.9%	2.2%	1.0%	0.9%	1.0%	0.7%	0.7%	0.7%	Capex / revenueCapex/rev
$213M	$209M	$238M	$274M	$220M	$266M	$286M	$260M	$250M	$255M	$255M	Owner earningsOwner earn.
43.3%	41.5%	43.7%	46.5%	41.7%	45.5%	46.3%	45.4%	44.4%	43.7%	43.7%	Owner earnings marginOE mgn
$213M	$209M	$235M	$270M	$215M	$266M	$286M	$260M	$250M	$255M	$255M	Free cash flowFCF
43.3%	41.5%	43.1%	45.7%	40.8%	45.5%	46.3%	45.4%	44.4%	43.7%	43.7%	Free cash flow marginFCF mgn
—	—	—	—	—	$11M	$23M	$2M	$19M	$0	$0	AcquisitionsAcquis.
$5M	$5M	$75M	$197M	$102M	$111M	$14M	$36M	$54M	$132M	—	BuybacksBuybacks
12%	8%	8%	3%	11%	5%	2%	8%	10%	4%	4%	ROICROIC
16%	10%	7%	7%	22%	14%	6%	18%	20%	10%	10%	Return on equityROE
16%	10%	7%	7%	22%	14%	6%	18%	20%	10%	10%	Retained to equityRetained/eq
											Balance sheet
$12M	$12M	$9M	$12M	$16M	$19M	$17M	$5M	$5M	$6M	$6M	Cash & investmentsCash+inv
$6M	$7M	$7M	$7M	$7M	$7M	$7M	$7M	$7M	$7M	$7M	GoodwillGoodwill
$801M	$841M	$855M	$1.0B	$954M	$1.2B	$1.1B	$1.1B	$1.0B	$1.1B	$1.1B	Total assetsAssets
$295M	$245M	$252M	$451M	$405M	$697M	$599M	$498M	$448M	$587M	$587M	Total debtDebt
$284M	$232M	$243M	$439M	$389M	$678M	$582M	$493M	$443M	$581M	$581M	Net debt / (cash)Net debt
6.2×	6.3×	5.0×	1.3×	4.3×	2.0×	0.5×	2.1×	2.6×	0.9×	0.9×	Interest coverageInt. cov.
$461M	$541M	$552M	$412M	$405M	$373M	$384M	$422M	$437M	$351M	$351M	Shareholders’ equityEquity
1.0%	1.1%	3.2%	4.9%	3.7%	3.0%	1.5%	−0.3%	−3.5%	—	−3.4%	Stock comp / revenueSBC/rev
											Per share
8.8M	9.0M	9.2M	8.0M	6.7M	6.4M	5.9M	5.9M	5.5M	5.0M	5.0M	Shares out (diluted)Shares
$55.91	$56.11	$59.16	$74.19	$79.13	$91.95	$104.52	$97.72	$102.45	$116.43	$116.43	Revenue / shareRev/sh
$8.38	$5.99	$4.05	$3.54	$13.23	$8.47	$3.60	$13.14	$16.21	$6.88	$6.88	EPS (diluted)EPS
$24.21	$23.31	$25.86	$34.48	$33.04	$41.86	$48.44	$44.33	$45.48	$50.83	$50.83	Owner earnings / shareOE/sh
$24.21	$23.31	$25.52	$33.91	$32.26	$41.86	$48.44	$44.33	$45.48	$50.83	$50.83	Free cash flow / shareFCF/sh
$0.78	$1.02	$1.07	$1.42	$1.75	$0.95	$0.99	$1.01	$0.67	$0.77	$0.77	Cap. spending / shareCapex/sh
$52.52	$60.40	$59.98	$51.80	$60.69	$58.61	$65.02	$72.06	$79.35	$69.84	$69.84	Book value / shareBVPS

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

	9-yr	5-yr
Revenue / share	+8.5%/yr	+8.0%/yr
Owner earnings / share	+8.6%/yr	+9.0%/yr
EPS	−2.2%/yr	−12.3%/yr
Capital spending / share	−0.1%/yr	−15.1%/yr
Book value / share	+3.2%/yr	+2.8%/yr

The record, charted

FY2017–2026

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

Share count

5Mpeak FY2019

ROIC

4%low FY2023

Net debt ÷ owner earnings

2.3×peak FY2022

Owner earnings vs. net income

Owner earningsNet income

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

$255Mowner earningsvs.$35Mnet incomelow FY2018

Where the cash went

ReinvestBuybacksDividendsAcquisitionsRetained

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

FY2017FY2026

Owner-earnings bridge

FY2022–FY2026cash-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 2026 the business turned $35M of profit into $255M 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$35M

Owner earnings$255M · 44% of revenue

	FY2026	FY2025	FY2024	FY2023	FY2022
Reported net income	$35M	$89M	$77M	$21M	$54M
Depreciation & amortizationnon-cash charge added back	+$6M	+$6M	+$7M	+$6M	+$6M
Stock-based compensationreal costnon-cash, but a real cost	—	−$20M	−$2M	+$9M	+$18M
Working capital & othertiming of cash in and out, other non-cash items	+$219M	+$178M	+$184M	+$255M	+$195M
Cash from operations	$259M	$254M	$266M	$292M	$272M
Capital expenditurecash put back in to keep running and to grow	−$4M	−$4M	−$6M	−$6M	−$6M
Owner earnings	$255M	$250M	$260M	$286M	$266M
Owner-earnings marginowner earnings ÷ revenue	44%	44%	45%	46%	46%

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.

III

Quality & stewardship

Returns, the balance sheet, capital allocation, and pay.

Owner’s Scorecard

FY2026 10-K · source on SEC EDGAR →

Will it survive?

Can it pay its interest? 0.9×

Does not cover its interest

Operating income $45M ÷ interest expense $49M

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? $581M · 12.8× operating profit

Heavy net debt

Cash $6M − debt $587M

What this means
Netting $6M of cash and short-term investments against $587M of debt leaves $581M owed, about 12.8× a year's operating profit (13.0× 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? —

Not enough data

What this means
The filing data didn't include the inputs for this check.

Is it a good business?

Return on invested capital 8%

Below average through the cycle

10-yr median, range 2%–12%; 4% latest = NOPAT $35M ÷ invested capital $932M

Industry peers: median 5%

What this means
The rate the business earns on the money tied up in it, Buffett's north star, because over time a stock tracks the ROIC beneath it. Above ~15% sustained hints at a moat; a return below the cost of capital (~8%) erodes value as a business grows rather than building it — the test Buffett weighs most. The headline is the median of the last 10 years (it ran 4% 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 44%

High through the cycle

10-yr median margin, range 42%–46%; latest $255M = operating cash $259M − maintenance capex $4M

Industry peers: median 15%

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 44% of revenue this year, a 44% median across 10 years. Treating stock comp as the real expense it is (less ($20M) of SBC) leaves $275M.
Are earnings backed by cash? 7.50×

Cash-backed

Cash from ops $259M ÷ net income $35M

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? 52%

Returns about half

Dividends + buybacks $132M ÷ Owner Earnings $255M

What this means
Of $255M Owner Earnings, $132M (52%) went back to shareholders, $0 dividends, $132M buybacks. Net of ($20M) stock comp, the real buyback was about $152M. 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? 0.67×

Harvesting

Capex $4M ÷ depreciation $6M

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 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 Miss

Revenue ≥ $2B · $585M

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 Pass

A profit every year (10-yr record) · no losses

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 · none paid

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 Near

Earnings +33% over the record · +22%

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 $14.43/share (latest year $7.45), the averaged base the calculator's gate runs on, and book value is $75.64/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, 2017–2026

Whether the record’s returns held, and what the capital reinvested earned.

Profitable years 10 of 10

What this means
Never lost money over the record, the earnings stability Graham insisted on.
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 23% → 15% (3-yr avg ends)

What this means
Through the cycle the operating margin slipped — about 23% early to 15% lately, median 17% — 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.
Owner earnings growth +2%/yr

What this means
Owner earnings grew about 2% a year over the record.
Worst year 2023 · 4.4% op. margin

What this means
Stayed profitable even in its hardest year, the resilience that survives recessions.
Share count −6.0%/yr

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

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 A competitive risk, new this year

Its FY2026 10-K names artificial intelligence as a competitive threat, in language that was not in the prior year's filing.

“If AI we utilize is deficient, inaccurate, or controversial, we could experience operational inefficiencies, competitive disadvantages, legal and regulatory challenges, brand or reputational damage, or other negative impacts on our business and financial performance.”

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, 2017–2026

Over the record, the business generated $2.5B of operating cash; how management split it reads as a balanced allocator, splitting cash between the business, owners, and the balance sheet.

Reinvested$74M · 3%
Buybacks$732M · 29%
Retained (debt / cash)$1.7B · 68%

Returned to owners$732M
30% of the owner earnings the business produced over the span, $0 as dividends and $732M as buybacks.
Average price paid for buybacks$120.31
Across the years where the filing reports a share count, 2M shares were bought for $282M, about $120.31 each. Year to year the price paid ranged from $52.20 (2017) to $129.81 (2020), and 2020, near the top of that range, was also its heaviest buyback year ($197M).
Net change in share count−42.7%
The diluted count fell from 9M to 5M, so the buybacks outran the stock issued to staff.
Dividend record—
No dividend line was reported in the filing data over the span; the record here neither confirms nor rules out a payout.

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	Mr. Prashad	$938k	$11.9M	$220M
2022	Mr. Prashad	$934k	$9.9M	$266M
2023	Mr. Prashad	$957k	−$12.8M	$286M
2024	Mr. Prashad	$966k	$7.3M	$260M
2025	Mr. Prashad	$2.3M	−$6.8M	$250M

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.

Stock-based compensation($20M)
The slice of the business handed to employees in shares this year, -3% of revenue, equal to -44% 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 World Acceptance Corporation 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 2017–2026.

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

Look hereDid debt outgrow the business?$295M → $587M
Debt rose from $295M to $587M while owner earnings went from about $220M to $255M — about 1.3 years of owner earnings in debt then, about 2.3 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

Is it less profitable than it was?
Did the share count rise anyway?
Did reported profit become cash?
Are "one-time" charges a yearly habit?

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

What an owner would ask, FY2026

read the 10-K →

Which reported numbers are a judgment call?
Management names Income taxes, Credit & receivables 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, Consumer Finance

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
CACCCredit Acceptance Corporation	$2.3B	—	45.7%	10%	54%
ONITOnity Group Inc.	$1.1B	—	41.0%	2%	15%
PWPPerella Weinberg Partners	$751M	—	-7.6%	—	15%
RMRegional Management Corp.	$646M	—	21.6%	6%	43%
JCAPJefferson Capital Inc.	$613M	—	50.8%	13%	—
WRLDWorld Acceptance Corporation	$585M	—	16.9%	8%	44%
DAVEDave Inc.	$554M	—	-4.2%	-12%	13%
FIGRFigure Technology Solutions Inc.	$507M	—	2.7%	4%	—
Group median	—	—	19.3%	6%	29%

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 World Acceptance Corporation has delivered.

Today’s price $

Through the cycle, World Acceptance Corporation earns about $258M on its 44.1% median owner-earnings margin. This year’s 43.7% 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 ($258M) Net of stock comp

—

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 · ’22→’26−2%/yr

Owner-earnings growth · ’17→’26+2%/yr

Owner-earnings yield—

P/E (3-yr earnings ’24–’26)—

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 $255M on 5M shares outstanding, per the 10-K/A cover, as of 2026-05-27; net debt $581M. The if-converted diluted count is 5M, 8% 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 WRLD against another business →

The owners of WRLD: the meeting and the votes →

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

Manual order: ← WRBY its page in the Manual WS →

Industry order: ← TROO the Consumer Finance chapter