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ATLCZ, Atlanticus Holdings Corp
Atlanticus is a financial technology company powering more inclusive financial solutions for Everyday Americans.
We leverage data, analytics, and innovative technology to unlock access to financial solutions for the millions of Americans who would otherwise be underserved.
We provide technology and other support services to lenders who offer an array of financial products and services to consumers.
The business
What it sells, where the money comes from, the kind of company it is.
Next report By 11/8 · the 10-Q for the quarter ended late September · due within 40 days of period end · has filed ~38 days after · the wire records it on arrival
The business in brief
read the 10-K →What this business is and what moves its needle, from its own SEC filings.
- What moves the needle
- Gross margin has run about 91% and operating margin about 23% 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 −369% to 731% 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 10%). The steadier read is owner earnings: roughly 30% of revenue reaches owners as cash, consistently. 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.
The record
Ten years of arithmetic, read across the cycle.
The record, 2017–2025
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 | TTMTTMJun 2026 | |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Income statement | ||||||||||
| $5M | $6M | $455M | $563M | $748M | $1.0B | $1.2B | $1.3B | $2.0B | $2.7B | RevenueRevenue |
| — | — | $406M | $500M | $673M | $951M | $1.1B | $1.2B | $1.8B | $2.5B | Gross profitGross prof. |
| — | — | 89% | 89% | 90% | 91% | 91% | 91% | 92% | 93% | Gross marginGross mgn |
| ($19M) | $41M | $83M | $166M | $274M | $232M | $239M | $300M | $463M | $651M | Operating incomeOp. inc. |
| −369.0% | 731.1% | 18.2% | 29.5% | 36.6% | 22.2% | 20.7% | 22.9% | 23.5% | 24.5% | Operating marginOp. mgn |
| ($47M) | $3M | $32M | $114M | $220M | $149M | $129M | $139M | $160M | — | Pretax incomePretax |
| ($41M) | $8M | $26M | $94M | $178M | $136M | $103M | $111M | $122M | $154M | Net incomeNet inc. |
| — | — | 17% | 18% | 19% | 10% | 21% | 21% | 24% | 25% | Effective tax rateTax rate |
| Cash flow & returns | ||||||||||
| ($26M) | $43M | $100M | $213M | $212M | $348M | $459M | $469M | $638M | $937M | Operating cash flowOp. cash |
| $1M | $987K | $8M | $8M | $2M | $5M | $4M | $5M | $10M | $17M | Depreciation & amortizationD&A |
| $12M | $33M | $64M | $109M | $29M | $203M | $349M | $349M | $502M | $760M | Working capital & otherWC & other |
| $395K | $1M | $250K | $749K | — | — | — | — | — | — | CapexCapex |
| 7.5% | 24.9% | 0.1% | 0.1% | — | — | — | — | — | — | Capex / revenueCapex/rev |
| ($27M) | $42M | $100M | $212M | — | — | — | — | — | — | Owner earningsOwner earn. |
| −509.5% | 753.6% | 21.9% | 37.6% | — | — | — | — | — | — | Owner earnings marginOE mgn |
| ($27M) | $41M | $100M | $212M | — | — | — | — | — | — | Free cash flowFCF |
| −509.5% | 746.5% | 21.9% | 37.6% | — | — | — | — | — | — | Free cash flow marginFCF mgn |
| — | — | — | — | — | — | — | $0 | $73M | $73M | AcquisitionsAcquis. |
| $389K | $723K | $3M | $3M | $25M | $89M | $18M | $53M | $70M | — | BuybacksBuybacks |
| ($80M) | ($135M) | ($434M) | ($293M) | ($475M) | ($682M) | ($672M) | ($747M) | ($1.5B) | — | Investing cash flowInv. cash |
| $85M | $162M | $369M | $162M | $510M | $261M | $163M | $394M | $1.1B | — | Financing cash flowFin. cash |
| $165K | $1M | ($354K) | $23K | ($5K) | ($36K) | $2K | $0 | — | — | Exchange-rate effectFX |
| ($22M) | $71M | $35M | $83M | $248M | ($73M) | ($50M) | $116M | $268M | — | Change in cashΔ cash |
| -8% | 10% | 9% | 14% | 14% | 11% | 10% | 18% | 6% | 9% | ROICROIC |
| — | — | 2919% | 122% | 62% | 42% | 26% | 23% | 20% | 22% | Return on equityROE |
| — | — | n/m | 122% | 62% | 42% | 26% | 23% | 20% | 22% | Retained to equityRetained/eq |
| Balance sheet | ||||||||||
| $42M | — | — | — | — | — | $339M | $375M | $621M | $555M | Cash & investmentsCash+inv |
| $3M | $4M | $3M | $2M | $7M | $10M | $11M | $11M | $13M | — | Net PP&ENet PP&E |
| $426M | $583M | $936M | $1.2B | $1.9B | $2.4B | $2.7B | $3.3B | $7.6B | $7.5B | Total assetsAssets |
| $266M | $431M | $749M | $883M | $1.3B | $1.7B | $1.9B | $1.2B | $5.8B | $5.6B | Total debtDebt |
| $224M | $431M | $749M | $883M | $1.3B | $1.7B | $1.5B | $821M | $5.2B | $5.0B | Net debt / (cash)Net debt |
| -0.7× | 1.1× | 1.6× | 3.2× | 5.1× | 2.8× | 2.2× | 1.9× | 1.5× | 1.5× | Interest coverageInt. cov. |
| ($36M) | ($22M) | $906K | $77M | $288M | $326M | $395M | $493M | $609M | $702M | Shareholders’ equityEquity |
| 29.0% | 23.8% | 0.4% | 0.2% | 0.4% | 0.4% | 0.3% | 0.3% | 0.2% | 0.3% | Stock comp / revenueSBC/rev |
| Per share | ||||||||||
| 13.9M | 14.0M | 15.3M | 20.1M | 20.9M | 19.4M | 18.9M | 18.8M | 19.2M | 19.1M | Shares out (diluted)Shares |
| $0.38 | $0.40 | $29.80 | $28.03 | $35.80 | $54.03 | $61.22 | $69.75 | $102.65 | $139.00 | Revenue / shareRev/sh |
| $-2.93 | $0.56 | $1.73 | $4.68 | $8.51 | $7.00 | $5.45 | $5.92 | $6.37 | $8.07 | EPS (diluted)EPS |
| $-1.93 | $2.99 | $6.53 | $10.55 | — | — | — | — | — | — | Owner earnings / shareOE/sh |
| $-1.93 | $2.96 | $6.53 | $10.55 | — | — | — | — | — | — | Free cash flow / shareFCF/sh |
| $0.03 | $0.10 | $0.02 | $0.04 | — | — | — | — | — | — | Cap. spending / shareCapex/sh |
| $-2.58 | $-1.56 | $0.06 | $3.84 | $13.78 | $16.85 | $20.90 | $26.22 | $31.74 | $36.77 | Book value / shareBVPS |
| 8-yr | 5-yr | |
|---|---|---|
| Revenue / share | +101.5%/yr | +29.6%/yr |
| EPS | — | +6.4%/yr |
| Capital spending / share | +9.6%/yr (3-yr) | +9.6%/yr (3-yr) |
| Book value / share | — | +52.5%/yr |
Where the cash went
ReinvestBuybacksDividendsAcquisitionsRetainedEach year's operating cash, by what management did with it: the mix, and how it drifts.
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 2020 the business turned $94M of profit into $212M of owner earnings: more cash than the profit line showed, after the non-cash charges and the capital it put back in.
| FY2020 | FY2019 | FY2018 | FY2017 | |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Reported net income | $94M | $26M | $8M | ($41M) |
| Depreciation & amortizationnon-cash charge added back | +$8M | +$8M | +$987K | +$1M |
| Stock-based compensationreal costnon-cash, but a real cost | +$1M | +$2M | +$1M | +$2M |
| Working capital & othertiming of cash in and out, other non-cash items | +$109M | +$64M | +$33M | +$12M |
| Cash from operations | $213M | $100M | $43M | ($26M) |
| Maintenance capital expenditurethe spending needed just to hold position and volume | −$749K | −$250K | −$987K | −$395K |
| Owner earnings | $212M | $100M | $42M | ($27M) |
| Growth capital expenditurediscretionary; spent to get bigger, not to stand still | — | — | −$396K | — |
| Free cash flow | $212M | $100M | $41M | ($27M) |
| Owner-earnings marginowner earnings ÷ revenue | 38% | 22% | 754% | -509% |
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 $1M), owner earnings is nearer $211M.
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 $463M ÷ interest expense $302M
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? $5.2B · 11.2× operating profitHeavy net debtCash $621M − debt $5.8B
What this means
Netting $621M of cash and short-term investments against $5.8B of debt leaves $5.2B owed, about 11.2× a year's operating profit (12.6× 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.
- Not enough data
What this means
The filing data didn't include the inputs for this check.
Is it a good business?
- Solid through the cycle9-yr median, range -8%–18%; 6% latest = NOPAT $351M ÷ invested capital $5.8BIndustry peers: median 8%
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 9 years (it ran 6% 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.
- Not enough dataIndustry peers: median 43%
What this means
The filing data didn't include the inputs for this check.
- Cash-backedCash from ops $638M ÷ net income $122M
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?
- Not enough data
What this means
The filing data didn't include the inputs for this check.
- Investing or harvesting? —Not enough data
What this means
The filing data didn't include the inputs for this check.
The promise and the pay packet
- Is the buyback buying ownership, or mopping up? 0.2%The count is edging downStock compensation $4M (fiscal 2025), 0.2% of revenue · repurchases $70M · diluted shares -1.0% since 2022
What this means
Stock handed to employees is a real cost paid in the owner's own currency: it is charged against profit, but the shares it creates are permanent. Many companies repurchase stock at the same time, which looks like a return of capital and often is not — if the count barely moves, the cash merely cancelled the pay packet and bought the owner nothing. The three states worth telling apart are a count genuinely shrinking, a count standing still despite large repurchases, and a count rising because the issuance was never offset at all.
Graham’s defensive tests · 0 of 2 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 NearRevenue ≥ $2B · $2.0B
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 NearA profit every year (9-yr record) · 1 loss year
What this means
Graham wanted earnings in each of the past ten years, the stability a defensive owner leans on.
- Dividend record —Uninterrupted dividends · no dividend line tagged in the data
What this means
An unbroken dividend was Graham's mark of durability. This record carries no dividends-paid line in any year — common for partnerships, whose distributions file under tags the chain doesn't read — so the criterion is withheld rather than judged on silence.
- Earnings growth —Earnings +33% over the record · —
What this means
Earnings were negative early in the record, a growth rate isn't meaningful.
- 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 $7.39/share (latest year $8.06), the averaged base the calculator's gate runs on, and book value is $40.13/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, 2017–2025
Whether the record’s returns held, and what the capital reinvested earned.
- Profitable years 8 of 9
What this means
Lost money in 1 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 127% → 22% (3-yr avg ends)
What this means
Through the cycle the operating margin slipped — about 127% early to 22% lately, median 23% — competition or costs are biting in.
- Reinvestment, incremental ROIC 9%
What this means
Reinvested capital came back at only a modest incremental return — near the cost of capital, where extra growth adds little per dollar. The record shows whether it is a soft stretch or a thinning moat.
- Owner earnings growth +175%/yr
What this means
Owner earnings grew about 175% a year over the record.
- Worst year 2017 · −369.0% op. margin
What this means
Operations went underwater in 2017, understand why before trusting the good years.
- Share count +4.1%/yr
What this means
The share count is rising, dilution works against you on a per-share basis.
All figures as filed; the source filing is linked above.
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.
Bars scaled to the largest single year.
Against what the business has and earns
Cash on hand as of Jun 30, 2026 comes to $555M against the $688M due in the twelve months after the Dec 31, 2025 schedule: about 81% of it, so the near maturities lean on refinancing or the rest of the year’s cash.
Maturity schedule extracted from the company’s Dec 31, 2025 annual report and reconciled to the balance-sheet debt.
How the cash was used, 2017–2020
Over the record, the business generated $329M of operating cash; how management split it reads as a cash builder, a large share of cash simply built up on the balance sheet.
- Reinvested$3M · 1%
- Buybacks$7M · 2%
- Retained (debt / cash)$319M · 97%
- Returned to owners$7M
2% of the owner earnings the business produced over the span, $0 as dividends and $7M as buybacks.
- Source of fundingOperating cash
Operating cash covered reinvestment and returns; over the span debt rose $5.3B and cash and short-term investments rose $513M.
- Average price paid for buybacks$6.69
Across the years where the filing reports a share count, 1M shares were bought for $7M, about $6.69 each. Year to year the price paid ranged from $2.46 (2017) to $13.66 (2020), and 2020, near the top of that range, was also its heaviest buyback year ($3M).
- Net change in share count36.9%
The diluted count rose from 14M to 19M: issuance (stock pay, deals) outran any buybacks, so owners were diluted on net.
- Dividend record—
No dividend line was reported in the filing data over the span; the record here neither confirms nor rules out a payout.
- Return on what it retained99%
Of the earnings it kept rather than paid out ($81M over the span), annual owner earnings (first three years vs last three) grew $80M, so each retained $1 added about 0.99 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” | Net income |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| 2021 | David G. Hanna | $1.7M | $1.7M | $178M |
| 2021 | Jeffrey A. Howard | $1.7M | $18.1M | $178M |
| 2022 | David G. Hanna | $2.2M | $398k | $136M |
| 2023 | David G. Hanna | $2.0M | $2.6M | $103M |
| 2024 | David G. Hanna | $1.8M | $2.9M | $111M |
| 2025 | David G. Hanna | $2.1M | $2.6M | $122M |
| 2025 | Jeffrey A. Howard | $2.1M | $2.6M | $122M |
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. Net income is the whole business's, as filed, for the same fiscal years.
- Insider ownership51%
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$4M
The slice of the business handed to employees in shares in fiscal 2025, 0.2% of revenue, equal to 0.9% 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.
What an owner would ask, FY2025
read the 10-K →- Which reported numbers are a judgment call?Management names Acquisitions, 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
Atlanticus Holdings Corp is listed here as a claim on a business rather than as the business itself — a preferred series, a bond or a warrant, filed under the same registrant as the common stock. A comparative table lines businesses up against one another, so there is none here. The business behind it is Atlanticus Holdings Corporation (ATLC), where the record, the scorecard and the peer bench are.
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 Atlanticus Holdings Corp has delivered.
Atlanticus Holdings Corp’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.
—
9.0% = the 4.71% 10-year Treasury (Aug 18, 2026) + 4.29 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 (4.71%, as of Aug 18, 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 — on 15M shares outstanding, per the 10-Q cover, as of 2026-08-01; net debt $5.0B. The if-converted diluted count is 19M, 26% above the shares outstanding: the dilution overhang (convertibles, options) a buyer inherits. 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.
Manual order: ← ATLCP its page in the Manual ATMU →
Industry order: ← ATLCP the Consumer Finance chapter CACC →