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Cogent Communications Holdings

CCOI on Nasdaq. Cogent Communications Holdings sells internet and network services to businesses worldwide. Market value $455m.

Watch this stockFree. We tell you when something changes.

Price checks use the past 12 months to June 2026. 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

Why it could be worth it

What to watch out for

See Media & telecom stocks that passed both tests

This is not advice. Check the numbers below.

Compare with another stock

Cash yield
past 12 months to June 2026
-30.0%low

For every $100 of what the whole company costs, it produced $-29.97 of spare cash in the past 12 months. A savings account pays about $4.

Price to profit
past 12 months to June 2026
35.2×full

You pay 35.2 years of operating profit for the business. The average large US company costs around 18.

Return on capital
five annual reports to December 2025
-3.7%five-year median

Each dollar kept in the business earns -4 cents a year. Above 10 is good.

Quality score: 28 of 100. Price score: 0 of 100. Our list needs 70 on quality and 60 on price.

$9.31 a share, 31% above its 1-year low

Over the past year the price has ranged from $7.13 to $45.69.

Dividend: 11.5% a year

Paid every year for at least 5 years

Yields this high often come before a cut. Check the company's latest news.

Prices from Tuesday’s close (6 October).

Five years of cash, in billions

0.1
0.1
-0.1
-0.2
-0.2
-0.1
2021202220232024202512 monthsto Jun '26
Revenue
$590m$600m$941m$1.0bn$976m
Operating margin
20.2%19.0%-13.7%-19.1%-10.4%
Debt to equity
n/an/a2.358.95n/a
Shares outstanding
0.05bn0.05bn0.05bn0.05bn0.05bn

Health checks

  • Free cash flow positive2 of 5 years
  • Accounting looks honest (Beneish)Nothing unusual
  • Financial strength (Piotroski)3 of 9
  • Profit backed by cash (accruals)Yes
  • DebtUnknown
  • Revenue growth, five yearsStrong, 11.4% a year
  • Buying back its own sharesNo, 7% more shares since 2021

The quarter to June 2026

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

  • Sales: $236 million last quarter, down 4% on a year ago.
  • Profit: $67 million, after a loss of $58 million a year ago.
  • It keeps 8 cents of each $1 of sales as operating profit, after losing 16 cents a year earlier.
  • Over the past 12 months it spent $143 million more cash than it brought in, compared with $233 million a year earlier.
  • 2% more shares than a year ago. Each share owns a bit less of the company.
  • Sales did not grow on a year ago in any of the last 4 quarters.
Sales by quarter
Sales by quarter
Quarter toAmount
September 2024$257m
December 2024$252m
March 2025$247m
June 2025$246m
September 2025$242m
December 2025$241m
March 2026$239m
June 2026$236m
Profit by quarter
Profit by quarter
Quarter toAmount
September 2024-$63m
December 2024-$43m
March 2025-$52m
June 2025-$58m
September 2025-$42m
December 2025-$31m
March 2026-$40m
June 2026$67m

From the company's quarterly reports to the SEC.

Dates

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

Who owns it

2 long-term investors we follow own it, unchanged from 2 last quarter. 225 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

No insider bought shares on the open market in the last 12 months. 4 sold $995,500.

  • KILMER HENRY W
    VP OF NETWORK STRATEGY
    Sold
    Date
    15 September 2026
    Shares
    2,400
    Price
    $9.21
    Value
    $22,104
  • WEED THADDEUS GERARD
    VICE PRESIDENT, CFO
    Sold
    Date
    2 September 2026
    Shares
    4,850
    Price
    $9.37
    Value
    $45,445
  • WEED THADDEUS GERARD
    VICE PRESIDENT, CFO
    Sold
    Date
    16 June 2026
    Shares
    4,850
    Price
    $16.79
    Value
    $81,432
  • KILMER HENRY W
    VP OF NETWORK STRATEGY
    Sold
    Date
    15 June 2026
    Shares
    2,400
    Price
    $17.01
    Value
    $40,824
  • FERGUSON Lewis H
    Director
    Sold
    Date
    28 May 2026
    Shares
    2,800
    Price
    $20.36
    Value
    $57,008
  • Kennedy Sheryl Lynn
    Director
    Sold
    Date
    14 May 2026
    Shares
    3,300
    Price
    $16.22
    Value
    $53,526
  • KILMER HENRY W
    VP OF NETWORK STRATEGY
    Sold
    Date
    6 March 2026
    Shares
    2,400
    Price
    $23.35
    Value
    $56,040
  • Kennedy Sheryl Lynn
    Director
    Sold
    Date
    5 March 2026
    Shares
    3,300
    Price
    $22.99
    Value
    $75,867
  • FERGUSON Lewis H
    Director
    Sold
    Date
    5 March 2026
    Shares
    2,206
    Price
    $23.03
    Value
    $50,804
  • WEED THADDEUS GERARD
    VICE PRESIDENT, CFO
    Sold
    Date
    5 March 2026
    Shares
    4,850
    Price
    $22.63
    Value
    $109,756

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 20 Feb 2026, plus the 10-Q filed 6 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

  • It owes more than it owns on paper (negative equity). Often that's from borrowing to buy back shares.
  • It isn't cheap on profits: 35.2× operating profit.

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.