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PAGP, Plains GP Holdings L.P. Class A

Pipelines & Midstream capital-intensive

A midstream energy business, paid to move and store hydrocarbons under contract.

Latest annual: FY2025 10-K

PAGP · Plains GP Holdings L.P. Class A

The business

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

Revenue · FY2025

$44.3B

−9.5% YoY · 14% 5-yr CAGR

Vital signs · TTM, with 5-yr average

Revenue $52.3B 5-yr avg $48.0B

Gross margin 8% 5-yr avg 8%

Operating margin 3.1% 5-yr avg 2.4%

Owner-earnings margin 5% 5-yr avg 4%

Free cash flow margin 5% 5-yr avg 4%

Next report By 11/8 · the 10-Q for the quarter ended late September · due within 40 days of period end · has filed ~39 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 10% and operating margin about 2.9% 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. On a spread this thin the operating result swings hard on small moves in cost or volume — it has ranged from −10% to 6.7% over the years, so the cost line is where the needle moves. Read this kind of business on throughput and the contracts behind it. On its own account, the filing leans hardest on concentrated dependence, 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.

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	TTMTTMJun 2026
											Income statement
$20.2B	$26.2B	$34.1B	$33.7B	$23.3B	$42.1B	$57.3B	$47.3B	$48.9B	$44.3B	$52.3B	RevenueRevenue
$2.9B	$3.2B	$4.3B	$4.2B	$2.9B	$3.6B	$4.2B	$3.4B	$3.7B	$3.8B	$4.1B	Gross profitGross prof.
15%	12%	13%	13%	12%	8%	7%	7%	8%	9%	8%	Gross marginGross mgn
1%	1%	1%	1%	1%	1%	1%	1%	1%	1%	1%	SG&A / revenueSG&A/rev
$990M	$1.1B	$2.3B	$2.0B	($2.4B)	$842M	$1.3B	$1.2B	$862M	$1.4B	$1.6B	Operating incomeOp. inc.
4.9%	4.4%	6.7%	5.9%	−10.2%	2.0%	2.2%	2.6%	1.8%	3.2%	3.1%	Operating marginOp. mgn
$738M	$896M	$2.4B	$2.2B	($2.6B)	$712M	$1.4B	$1.4B	$963M	$1.4B	—	Pretax incomePretax
$94M	($731M)	$334M	$331M	($568M)	$60M	$168M	$198M	$103M	$260M	$554M	Net incomeNet inc.
11%	—	13%	8%	—	16%	17%	9%	13%	7%	32%	Effective tax rateTax rate
											Cash flow & returns
$718M	$2.5B	$2.6B	$2.5B	$1.5B	$2.0B	$2.4B	$2.7B	$2.5B	$2.9B	$3.0B	Operating cash flowOp. cash
$515M	$519M	$521M	$604M	$656M	$777M	$968M	$912M	$901M	$953M	$973M	Depreciation & amortizationD&A
$109M	$2.7B	$1.7B	$1.6B	$1.4B	$1.2B	$1.3B	$1.6B	$1.5B	$1.7B	$1.3B	Working capital & otherWC & other
$1.3B	$1.0B	$1.6B	$1.2B	$738M	$336M	$455M	$408M	$448M	$643M	$601M	CapexCapex
6.6%	3.9%	4.8%	3.5%	3.2%	0.8%	0.8%	0.9%	0.9%	1.5%	1.1%	Capex / revenueCapex/rev
$203M	$2.0B	$2.1B	$1.9B	$772M	$1.7B	$1.9B	$2.3B	$2.0B	$2.3B	$2.4B	Owner earningsOwner earn.
1.0%	7.5%	6.1%	5.6%	3.3%	3.9%	3.4%	4.9%	4.2%	5.2%	4.5%	Owner earnings marginOE mgn
($616M)	$1.5B	$970M	$1.3B	$772M	$1.7B	$1.9B	$2.3B	$2.0B	$2.3B	$2.4B	Free cash flowFCF
−3.1%	5.6%	2.8%	3.9%	3.3%	3.9%	3.4%	4.9%	4.2%	5.2%	4.5%	Free cash flow marginFCF mgn
$282M	$1.3B	—	$50M	$310M	$32M	$149M	$425M	$248M	$2.7B	$2.1B	AcquisitionsAcquis.
($1.3B)	($1.6B)	($813M)	($1.8B)	($1.1B)	$386M	($526M)	($702M)	($875M)	($3.4B)	—	Investing cash flowInv. cash
$571M	($940M)	($1.8B)	($717M)	($430M)	($2.0B)	($1.9B)	($2.0B)	($1.7B)	$474M	—	Financing cash flowFin. cash
$4M	$4M	($9M)	($3M)	($8M)	($5M)	($3M)	$3M	($13M)	$14M	—	Exchange-rate effectFX
$20M	($10M)	$29M	$15M	($21M)	$393M	($52M)	$49M	($104M)	($20M)	—	Change in cashΔ cash
1%	-6%	3%	2%	-5%	0%	1%	1%	1%	2%	—	Return on equityROE
1%	−6%	3%	2%	−5%	0%	1%	1%	1%	2%	—	Retained to equityRetained/eq
											Balance sheet
$50M	$40M	$69M	$47M	$25M	$452M	$404M	$453M	$349M	$329M	$1.1B	Cash & investmentsCash+inv
$2.3B	$3.0B	$2.5B	$3.6B	$2.6B	$4.7B	$3.9B	$3.8B	$3.7B	$3.6B	$5.3B	ReceivablesReceiv.
$1.3B	$713M	$640M	$604M	$647M	$783M	$729M	$548M	$261M	$211M	$84M	InventoryInvent.
$2.6B	$3.3B	$2.7B	$3.7B	$2.4B	$4.8B	$4.0B	$3.8B	$3.6B	$3.5B	$4.9B	Accounts payablePayables
$1.0B	$418M	$389M	$531M	$775M	$677M	$591M	$463M	$293M	$352M	$409M	Operating working capitalOper. WC
$4.3B	$4.0B	$3.5B	$4.6B	$3.7B	$6.1B	$5.4B	$4.9B	$4.8B	$4.7B	$6.5B	Current assetsCur. assets
$4.7B	$4.5B	$3.5B	$5.0B	$4.3B	$6.2B	$5.9B	$5.0B	$4.9B	$4.9B	$5.9B	Current liabilitiesCur. liab.
0.9×	0.9×	1.0×	0.9×	0.9×	1.0×	0.9×	1.0×	1.0×	1.0×	1.1×	Current ratioCurr. ratio
$13.9B	$14.1B	$14.8B	$15.4B	$14.6B	$14.9B	$15.3B	$15.8B	$13.4B	$16.9B	—	Net PP&ENet PP&E
$2.3B	$2.6B	$2.5B	$2.5B	$0	—	—	—	—	—	—	GoodwillGoodwill
$26.1B	$26.8B	$26.8B	$30.0B	$26.0B	$30.0B	$29.2B	$28.6B	$27.8B	$31.3B	$30.2B	Total assetsAssets
$11.8B	$9.9B	$9.2B	$9.7B	$10.2B	$9.2B	$8.4B	$7.8B	$7.6B	$11.3B	$8.4B	Total debtDebt
$11.8B	$9.9B	$9.1B	$9.6B	$10.2B	$8.8B	$8.0B	$7.3B	$7.3B	$10.9B	$7.4B	Net debt / (cash)Net debt
2.1×	2.2×	5.3×	4.7×	-5.5×	2.0×	3.2×	3.2×	2.3×	3.1×	3.1×	Interest coverageInt. cov.
$10.7B	$12.4B	$13.3B	$14.5B	$11.2B	$14.2B	$14.6B	$15.0B	$14.3B	$14.2B	—	Shareholders’ equityEquity

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 turned $260M of profit into $2.3B 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$260M

Owner earnings$2.3B · 5% of revenue

	FY2025	FY2024	FY2023	FY2022	FY2021
Reported net income	$260M	$103M	$198M	$168M	$60M
Depreciation & amortizationnon-cash charge added back	+$953M	+$901M	+$912M	+$968M	+$777M
Working capital & othertiming of cash in and out, other non-cash items	+$1.7B	+$1.5B	+$1.6B	+$1.3B	+$1.2B
Cash from operations	$2.9B	$2.5B	$2.7B	$2.4B	$2.0B
Capital expenditurecash put back in to keep running and to grow	−$643M	−$448M	−$408M	−$455M	−$336M
Owner earnings	$2.3B	$2.0B	$2.3B	$1.9B	$1.7B
Owner-earnings marginowner earnings ÷ revenue	5%	4%	5%	3%	4%

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

FY2025 10-K · source on SEC EDGAR →

Will it survive?

Can it pay its interest? 3.1×

Adequate

Operating income $1.4B ÷ interest expense $467M

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? $10.9B · 7.7× operating profit

Heavy net debt

Cash $329M − debt $11.3B

What this means
Netting $329M of cash and short-term investments against $11.3B of debt leaves $10.9B owed, about 7.7× a year's operating profit (7.9× 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? 0d

Tight

DSO 30 + DIO 2 − DPO 31 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?

Return on invested capital —

Not enough data

Industry peers: median 9%

What this means
The filing data didn't include the inputs for this check.
Owner-earnings margin 5%

Thin through the cycle

10-yr median margin, range 1%–8%; latest $2.3B = operating cash $2.9B − maintenance capex $643M

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 5% of revenue this year, a 5% median across 10 years.
Are earnings backed by cash? 11.27×

Cash-backed

Cash from ops $2.9B ÷ net income $260M

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? 0%

Reinvests most of it

Dividends + buybacks $8M ÷ Owner Earnings $2.3B — this fiscal year

What this means
Of $2.3B Owner Earnings, $8M (0%) went back to shareholders, $0 dividends, $8M buybacks. Returning most of it is the mark of a mature business with little left to reinvest at a high return; reinvesting most could mean a long runway, or empire-building. The split doesn't say which; the return earned on it (see ROIC) does.
Investing or harvesting? 0.67×

Harvesting

Capex $643M ÷ depreciation & amortization as filed $953M

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 Pass

Revenue ≥ $2B · $44.3B

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× · 0.96×

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 · $11.3B vs ($198M) 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) · 2 loss years

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 $0.94/share (latest year $1.31), the averaged base the calculator's gate runs on, and book value is $71.83/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 8 of 10

What this means
Lost money in 2 year(s), look at what happened there before trusting the average.
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 5% → 3% (3-yr avg ends)

What this means
Through the cycle the operating margin slipped — about 5% early to 3% lately, median 3% — 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 +8%/yr

What this means
Owner earnings grew about 8% a year over the record.
Worst year 2020 · −10.2% op. margin

What this means
Operations went underwater in 2020, understand why before trusting the good years.

All figures as filed; the source filing is linked above.

Current Position

as of the latest quarter, Jun 30, 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$6.5B

Cash & short-term investments$1.1B
Receivables$5.3B
Inventory$84M
Other current assets$119M

Current liabilities$5.9B

Debt due within a year$9M
Accounts payable$4.9B
Other current liabilities$900M

Current ratio1.12×all current assets ÷ what's due · Graham looked for 2×

Quick ratio1.10×stricter: inventory excluded

Cash ratio0.18×strictest: cash alone against what's due

Working capital$679Mthe cushion left after near-term bills

Debt due this year vs. cash$9M due · $1.1B cash covered by cash on hand, no refinancing forced · both figures from the Jun 30, 2026 balance sheet

Revenue, latest quarter vs. a year ago+66.3%the freshest read on whether the business is still growing

Current ratio, recent quarters1.0× → 1.1×

Deeper floors

Debt incl. operating leases$1.3B$221M of it operating leases

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$750M

'27$0

'28$0

'29$1.0B

'30$750M

later$6.7B

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$750Mthe first rung: what must be repaid or rolled over within the year

Within two years$750Mthe near wall, the part most exposed to today’s credit conditions

Biggest single year$1.0Bin 2029the lumpiest maturity, where a refinancing, if needed, is largest

Total scheduled principal$9.2Bevery year plus what lies beyond, as the footnote totals it

Against what the business has and earns

Cash & short-term investments, Jun 30, 2026$1.1B

One year of owner earnings (FY2025)$2.3B

Together, against $750M due next year4.5×

Cash on hand as of Jun 30, 2026 plus a year’s owner earnings comes to $3.3B against the $750M due in the twelve months after the Dec 31, 2025 schedule: 4.5 times it.

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

How the cash was used, 2016–2025

Over the record, the business generated $22.4B of operating cash; how management split it reads as a balanced allocator, splitting cash between the business, owners, and the balance sheet.

Reinvested$8.2B · 37%
Buybacks$8M · 0%
Retained (debt / cash)$14.2B · 63%

Returned to owners$8M
0% of the owner earnings the business produced over the span, $0 as dividends and $8M as buybacks.
Source of fundingOperating cash
Operating cash covered reinvestment and returns; over the span debt fell $3.4B and cash and short-term investments rose $1.0B.
Average price paid for buybacks—
Buybacks ran $8M over the span, but the filings don't tag the share count needed to deduce the average price paid.
Net change in share count—
No continuous share count across the span.
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 retained328%
Of the earnings it kept rather than paid out ($241M over the span), annual owner earnings (first three years vs last three) grew $792M, so each retained $1 added about 3.28 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	Willie Chiang	$4.4M	$4.8M	$1.7B
2022	Willie Chiang	$8.3M	$14.5M	$1.9B
2023	Willie Chiang	$7.5M	$16.4M	$2.3B
2024	Willie Chiang	$8.5M	$11.9M	$2.0B
2025	Willie Chiang	$12.3M	$18.6M	$2.3B

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 ownership2.8%
The stake all directors and executive officers hold together, per the 2026 proxy: skin in the game, the first thing Munger reads.

Peers, Pipelines & Midstream

The same industry, side by side on owner economics. Each column names the period it is read over, and a median resting on fewer than three years carries that count beside it; the group median at the foot is the line to read each figure against.

Company	Revenuelatest FY, USD	Gross marginmedian over the record	Op. marginmedian over the record	ROICmedian over the record	Owner earn. marginmedian over the record
ETEnergy Transfer LP Common	$85.5B	25%	10.3%	9%	8%
EPDEnterprise Products Partners L.P.	$52.6B	27%	14.4%	12%	12%
PAGPPlains GP Holdings L.P. Class A	$44.3B	10%	2.9%	-9%1y	5%
PAAPlains All American Pipeline L.P. Common	$44.3B	10%	2.9%	6%	5%
OKEONEOK Inc.	$33.6B	29%	15.8%	8%	13%
LNGCheniere Energy Inc.	$20.0B	44%3y	25.1%	19%	17%
MPLXMPLX LP Common	$9.7B	—	40.3%	10%	47%
SOBOSouth Bow Corporation	$2.0B	82%	51.5%	—	27%
Group median	—	27%	15.1%	9%	13%

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 Plains GP Holdings L.P. Class A has delivered.

Today’s price $

Through the cycle, Plains GP Holdings L.P. Class A earns about $2.0B on its 4.5% median owner-earnings margin. This year’s 5.2% 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 ($2.0B) Net of stock comp (−$99M TTM)

—

The assumptions Required return 9% Years of high growth 10 Terminal growth 2.5%

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.

Implied by the price—

Owner-earnings growth · ’21→’25+5%/yr

Owner-earnings growth · ’16→’25+20%/yr

Owner-earnings yield—

Against a high-grade bond: Graham’s yardstick bond yield%

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 $2.4B on 198M shares outstanding (a weighted cover-text, the only count this filer tags); net debt $7.4B. The if-converted diluted count is 220M, 11% 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 PAGP against another business →

The owners of PAGP: the meeting and the votes →

Cite: Owner Scorecard, "Plains GP Holdings L.P. Class A (PAGP), the owner's record," https://ownerscorecard.com/c/PAGP, data as of 2026-08-17.

Manual order: ← PAG its page in the Manual PAHC →

Industry order: ← PAA the Pipelines & Midstream chapter PBA →