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CF Industries Holdings

CF on NYSE. CF Industries Holdings Industries sells ammonia and nitrogen fertilizer to farmers and industrial customers. Market value $17.6bn.

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?

Worth a closer look

Why it could be worth it

What to watch out for

Nothing stood out in the numbers we check.

Read what could go wrong

This is not advice. Check the numbers below.

Compare with another stock

Cash yield
past 12 months to June 2026
10.9%very high

For every $100 of what the whole company costs, it produced $10.88 of spare cash in the past 12 months. A savings account pays about $4.

Price to profit
past 12 months to June 2026
5.8×cheap

You pay 5.8 years of operating profit for the business. The average large US company costs around 18.

Return on capital
five annual reports to December 2025
27.1%five-year median

Each dollar kept in the business earns 27 cents a year. Above 10 is good.

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

$116.02 a share, 54% above its 1-year low

Over the past year the price has ranged from $75.42 to $141.96.

Dividend: 1.8% a year

Paid every year for at least 5 years

Prices from Monday’s close (5 October).

Five years of cash, in billions

2.4
3.4
2.3
1.8
1.8
1.9
2021202220232024202512 monthsto Jun '26
Revenue
$6.5bn$11.2bn$6.6bn$5.9bn$7.1bn
Operating margin
26.4%48.2%33.6%29.4%32.5%
Debt to equity
1.080.590.520.600.66
Shares outstanding
0.20bn0.19bn0.17bn0.16bn0.15bn

Health checks

  • Free cash flow positive5 of 5 years
  • Accounting looks honest (Beneish)Nothing unusual
  • Financial strength (Piotroski)8 of 9
  • Profit backed by cash (accruals)Yes
  • Debt0.66× equity
  • Revenue growth, five yearsStrong, 11.4% a year
  • Buying back its own sharesYes, 23% fewer since 2021

The quarter to June 2026

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

  • Sales: $2.2 billion last quarter, up 18% on a year ago.
  • Profit: $727 million, up 88% on a year ago.
  • It keeps 41 cents of each $1 of sales as operating profit, up from 30 cents a year earlier.
  • Spare cash over the past 12 months: $1.9 billion, up from $1.8 billion.
  • 6% fewer shares than a year ago. Each share owns a bit more of the company.
  • Debt is $736 million more than cash, down from $1.3 billion 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$1.4bn
December 2024$1.5bn
March 2025$1.7bn
June 2025$1.9bn
September 2025$1.7bn
December 2025$1.9bn
March 2026$2.0bn
June 2026$2.2bn
Profit by quarter
Profit by quarter
Quarter toAmount
September 2024$276m
December 2024$328m
March 2025$312m
June 2025$386m
September 2025$353m
December 2025$404m
March 2026$615m
June 2026$727m

From the company's quarterly reports to the SEC.

Dates

Next results (estimated)
4 November 2026
Last annual report (10-K)
25 February 2026
Next quarterly (estimated, 10-Q)
5 November 2026

Who owns it

5 long-term investors we follow own it, unchanged from 5 last quarter. 959 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

6 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. 8 sold $72m, $2m of it under preset trading plans.

  • Mayer Erik M.
    VP, Clean Energy & BusDevelop
    Sold
    Date
    17 March 2026
    Shares
    1,500
    Price
    $124.69
    Value
    $187,035
  • Hoker Richard A
    VP and Corporate Controller
    Sold
    Date
    17 March 2026
    Shares
    3,499
    Price
    $125.38
    Value
    $438,705
  • Frost Bert A
    EVP, Chief Commercial Officer
    Sold
    Date
    17 March 2026
    Shares
    6,000
    Price
    $126.00
    Value
    $756,000
  • Will W Anthony
    Director
    Sold
    Date
    13 March 2026
    Shares
    53,026
    Price
    $130.83
    Value
    $7m
  • Menzel Susan L
    EVP and Chief Admin. Officer
    Sold
    Date
    12 March 2026
    Shares
    18,041
    Price
    $136.06
    Value
    $2m
  • Frost Bert A
    EVP, Chief Commercial Officer
    Sold
    Date
    12 March 2026
    Shares
    6,250
    Price
    $136.69
    Value
    $854,313
  • Will W Anthony
    Director
    Sold
    Date
    11 March 2026
    Shares
    28,625
    Price
    $118.64
    Value
    $3m
  • Frost Bert A
    EVP, Chief Commercial Officer
    Sold
    under a preset trading plan
    Date
    9 March 2026
    Shares
    5,534
    Price
    $116.21
    Value
    $643,106
  • McGrane Michael Patrick
    SVP, Gen. Counsel & Secretary
    Sold
    Date
    6 March 2026
    Shares
    3,666
    Price
    $116.50
    Value
    $427,089
  • Mayer Erik M.
    VP, Clean Energy & BusDevelop
    Sold
    Date
    6 March 2026
    Shares
    2,200
    Price
    $116.25
    Value
    $255,750

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 25 Feb 2026, plus the 10-Q filed 6 Aug 2026 and 8 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.

What changed in the risks this year

Companies must list what could hurt them each year. These are the parts that changed since last year’s report.

  • Regulatory or legislative provisions related to GHG emissions in the jurisdictions in which we operate or conduct business could materially adversely affect our business, financial condition, results of operations and cash flows.

    Could happen
    Beginning on January 1, 2026, importers of nitrogen fertilizer products into the EU became subject to its carbon border adjustment mechanism (CBAM) and will be required to purchase certificates in 2027 reflecting the direct and indirect carbon emissions embedded in covered imports. While some EU member state officials, including from France and Italy, are advocating that the EU Commission temporarily suspend the application of the CBAM to fertilizers, or for fertilizers to be wholly excluded from it, the EU has not yet adopted an exemption process, and it remains unclear whether such efforts will be successful. Other governments are also considering border taxes for carbon-intensive products, including the United Kingdom, which is introducing a carbon border adjustment mechanism currently expected to apply from January 1, 2027. The imposition of border taxes, the details of their implementation and uncertainty arising from suspensions of or exemptions to them may impact the development of a market for low-carbon ammonia, investments in low-carbon ammonia, including our returns on such investments, and trade flows, which could adversely impact our business.
    Read more

Read it in the annual report

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.