Community Financial System

CBU on NYSE. Community Financial System sells banking and financial services to people, businesses and governments. Market value $3.2bn.

Watch this stockFree. We tell you when something changes.

Price checks use the past 12 months to June 2026. Some use the latest annual report instead, as marked. Quality checks use five annual reports, the latest for the year to December 2025.

Should I look at this?

Not a fit for our list right now

See Financial services stocks that passed both tests

This is not advice. Check the numbers below.

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Return on equity
five annual reports to December 2025
10.3%five-year median

Yearly profit per dollar of owners' money: 10 cents. Above 10 is good.

Price to book
quarterly report to June 2026
1.5×

What you pay for each dollar of net assets: $1.51.

Earnings yield
past 12 months to June 2026
7.3%

Profit per $100 you pay: $7.28.

Quality score: 56 of 100. Price score: 82 of 100. Our list needs 70 on quality and 60 on price.

$59.58 a share, 11% above its 1-year low

Over the past year the price has ranged from $53.46 to $71.11.

Dividend: 3.1% a year

Paid every year for at least 5 years

Prices from Tuesday’s close (6 October).

Five years of cash, in billions

n/a
n/a
n/a
n/a
n/a
20212022202320242025
Revenue
n/a$679m$652m$746m$818m
Operating margin
n/an/an/an/an/a
Debt to equity
n/an/an/an/an/a
Shares outstanding
0.05bn0.05bn0.05bn0.05bn0.05bn

Health checks

  • Free cash flow positiveDoesn't apply to banks and insurers
  • Accounting checksDoesn't apply to banks and insurers
  • DebtDoesn't apply to banks and insurers
  • Revenue growth, five yearsSlow, 6.4% a year
  • Buying back its own sharesYes, 2% fewer since 2021

The quarter to June 2026

How the business did, compared with the same quarter a year earlier.

  • Sales: $223 million last quarter, up 12% on a year ago.
  • Profit: $61 million, up 19% on a year ago.
  • Spare cash over the past 12 months: $247 million, up from $199 million.
  • About the same number of shares as a year ago.
  • Sales grew on a year ago in each of the last 4 quarters.
Sales by quarter
Sales by quarter
Quarter toAmount
September 2024$189m
December 2024$196m
March 2025$196m
June 2025$199m
September 2025$207m
December 2025$215m
March 2026$213m
June 2026$223m
Profit by quarter
Profit by quarter
Quarter toAmount
September 2024$44m
December 2024$50m
March 2025$50m
June 2025$51m
September 2025$55m
December 2025$54m
March 2026$57m
June 2026$61m

From the company's quarterly reports to the SEC.

Dates

Next results (estimated)
n/a
Last annual report (10-K)
27 February 2026
Next quarterly (estimated, 10-Q)
6 November 2026

Who owns it

None of the long-term investors we follow own it. 279 funds in all.

Jun '25
Dec '25
Jun '26
Largest holders overall

From 13F filings for the quarter ended 30 June 2026.

Big holders and activists

4 investors own more than 5%.

From Schedule 13D and 13G filings: anyone owning more than 5% must file one.

What insiders did

In the last 12 months, 3 insiders bought $75,265 of shares on the open market. 5 sold $2m.

Cluster buy3 insiders bought within 30 days (24 August 2026 to 9 September 2026).
  • Singh Savneet
    Director
    Bought
    Date
    9 September 2026
    Shares
    400
    Price
    $62.47
    Value
    $24,988
  • Vaccaro John A
    Director
    Bought
    Date
    27 August 2026
    Shares
    317
    Price
    $63.11
    Value
    $20,006
  • Hall Brenda M
    Director
    Bought
    Date
    24 August 2026
    Shares
    476
    Price
    $63.59
    Value
    $30,271
  • Bolus Mark J.
    Director
    Sold
    Date
    25 June 2026
    Shares
    12,191
    Price
    $67.00
    Value
    $816,786
  • STICKELS ERIC
    Director
    Sold
    Date
    8 June 2026
    Shares
    2,000
    Price
    $63.98
    Value
    $127,960
  • Whipple John F.
    Director
    Sold
    Date
    4 February 2026
    Shares
    4,246
    Price
    $65.17
    Value
    $276,712
  • STEELE SALLY A
    Director
    Sold
    Date
    3 February 2026
    Shares
    4,000
    Price
    $64.12
    Value
    $256,480
  • STICKELS ERIC
    Director
    Sold
    Date
    3 February 2026
    Shares
    2,000
    Price
    $64.75
    Value
    $129,500
  • Gillan-Myer Maureen A
    EVP, Chief Admin & HR Officer
    Sold
    Date
    29 December 2025
    Shares
    3,450
    Price
    $58.85
    Value
    $203,054

From Form 4 filings: insiders must report trades in their own company's shares within two days.

Warning signs in its filings

Problems the company itself reported to the SEC, in its own words.

None of the warning signs we check for were found.

We look for five warning signs: doubt it can keep going, weak checks on its own accounts, a notice that its past accounts can't be relied on, a change of auditor, and one customer bringing in a big share of sales. We don't check lawsuits, investigations or debt yet.

We checked the auditor's report, internal controls, restatement notices, auditor changes and big customers in the 10-K filed 27 Feb 2026, plus the 10-Q filed 7 Aug 2026 and 6 later 8-Ks.

A 10-K is the yearly report every US company files with the SEC. An 8-K is a short notice of a big event.

What could go wrong

Cheap for a reason is the question the numbers cannot answer.

Whether the price already reflects the risks is what the deep dive is for.

The deep dive

Everything above is arithmetic on public filings. The deep dive reads the last ten years of annual reports, the proxy statements, and the earnings calls, then argues the case the way Buffett, Klarman, and Hohn would, and checks every claim against the source.

  • What the business is worth, as a range, and the margin of safety at today’s price
  • Prices to start buying, buy, and buy hard
  • The three things that would make this a mistake
  • Every number footnoted to the filing it came from
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What a finished deep dive looks like

Not advice. Numbers on this page come from SEC filings and are updated each night; prices are updated again after the US market closes. The five-year figures are rounded.