Clorox
CLX on NYSE. Clorox sells cleaning, household, and personal care products to consumers and businesses. Market value $9.9bn.
Price checks use the past 12 months to June 2026. Quality checks use five annual reports, the latest for the year to June 2025.
The company doesn't report operating profit, so we work it out from pre-tax profit and interest.
The latest annual report is over 15 months old, so we don't rank it.
Should I look at this?
Not a fit for our list right now
Why it could be worth it
See Everyday goods stocks that passed both tests
This is not advice. Check the numbers below.
For every $100 of what the whole company costs, it produced $4.01 of spare cash in the past 12 months. A savings account pays about $4.
You pay 16.4 years of operating profit for the business. The average large US company costs around 18.
Each dollar kept in the business earns 18 cents a year. Above 10 is good.
Quality score: not known. Price score: not known. Our list needs 70 on quality and 60 on price.
$83.52 a share, 6% above its 1-year low
Over the past year the price has ranged from $79.12 to $128.90.
Dividend: 6.0% a year
Paid every year for at least 5 years
Prices from Tuesday’s close (6 October).
Five years of cash, in billions
Spare cash swings from quarter to quarter here: $405 million in the past 12 months, $761 million in the year to June 2025.
| Revenue | |||||
| Revenue | $7.3bn | $7.1bn | $7.4bn | $7.1bn | $7.1bn |
| Operating margin | |||||
| Operating margin | 13.6% | 10.0% | 4.4% | 6.9% | 16.4% |
| Debt to equity | |||||
| Debt to equity | 6.82 | 4.91 | 11.62 | 7.68 | 7.86 |
| Shares outstanding | |||||
| Shares outstanding | 0.12bn | 0.12bn | 0.12bn | 0.12bn | 0.12bn |
Health checks
- Free cash flow positive5 of 5 years
- Accounting looks honest (Beneish)Nothing unusual
- Financial strength (Piotroski)7 of 9
- Profit backed by cash (accruals)Yes
- Debt7.86× equity
- Revenue growth, five yearsSlow, 1.1% a year
- Buying back its own sharesRoughly flat
The quarter to June 2026
How the business did, compared with the same quarter a year earlier.
- Sales: $1.9 billion last quarter, down 2% on a year ago.
- Profit: $163 million, down 51% on a year ago.
- Spare cash over the past 12 months: $405 million, down from $761 million.
- Debt is $5 billion more than cash, up from $2.4 billion a year ago.
- Sales grew on a year ago in 1 of the last 4 quarters.
| Quarter to | Amount |
|---|---|
| September 2024 | $1.8bn |
| December 2024 | $1.7bn |
| March 2025 | $1.7bn |
| June 2025 | $2.0bn |
| September 2025 | $1.4bn |
| December 2025 | $1.7bn |
| March 2026 | $1.7bn |
| June 2026 | $1.9bn |
| Quarter to | Amount |
|---|---|
| September 2024 | $99m |
| December 2024 | $193m |
| March 2025 | $186m |
| June 2025 | $332m |
| September 2025 | $80m |
| December 2025 | $157m |
| March 2026 | $187m |
| June 2026 | $163m |
From the company's quarterly reports to the SEC.
Dates
- Next results (estimated)
- 3 November 2026
- Last annual report (10-K)
- 7 August 2026
- Next quarterly (estimated, 10-Q)
- 30 July 2026
Who owns it
10 long-term investors we follow own it, down from 11 last quarter. 1,044 funds in all.
- Yacktman Asset ManagementStephen Yacktman
- Value
- $5m
- Share of fund
- <0.1%
- Hillman Capital ManagementMark Hillman
- Value
- $336,999
- Share of fund
- 0.2%
| Fund | Value | Share of that fund | Change |
|---|---|---|---|
| Nuance InvestmentsScott Moore | $50m | 8.6% | Added |
| FundsmithTerry Smith | $26m | 0.2% | Added |
| Barrow HanleyBarrow Hanley team | $10m | <0.1% | Cut |
| Gotham Asset ManagementJoel Greenblatt | $6m | <0.1% | Cut |
| Yacktman Asset ManagementStephen Yacktman | $5m | <0.1% | |
| Jensen Investment ManagementEric Schoenstein | $5m | 0.1% | Added |
| Cambiar InvestorsBrian Barish | $3m | 0.1% | Cut |
| Cullen Capital ManagementJames Cullen | $1m | <0.1% | Added |
| Royce & AssociatesChuck Royce | $379,660 | <0.1% | New |
| Hillman Capital ManagementMark Hillman | $336,999 | 0.2% |
Sold out this quarter
Largest holders overall
- Banque Cantonale Vaudoise$1.4bnAdded
- BlackRock$959m
- State Street$805mAdded
- Vanguard Capital Management$754m
- Invesco$574mAdded
- Vanguard Portfolio Management$554m
- Geode Capital Management$310m
- VAN ECK Associates$284mCut
- Morgan Stanley$214mCut
- Millennium Management$198mAdded
From 13F filings for the quarter ended 30 June 2026.
Big holders and activists
2 investors own more than 5%.
- BlackRock, Inc.Passive investor8.1%−1.3 ptsSince 30 June 2025
- Vanguard Capital ManagementPassive investor7.3%Since 31 March 2026
- Sold down below 5%Since 31 December 2024
- The Vanguard GroupPassive investorSold down below 5%Since 13 March 2026
- UBS Group AGPassive investorSold down below 5%Since 31 March 2025
| Holder | Stake | Since | |
|---|---|---|---|
BlackRock, Inc. Passive investor | 8.1%−1.3 pts | 30 June 2025 | |
Vanguard Capital Management Passive investor | 7.3% | 31 March 2026 | |
Sold down below 5% | 31 December 2024 | ||
The Vanguard Group Passive investor | Sold down below 5% | 13 March 2026 | |
UBS Group AG Passive investor | Sold down below 5% | 31 March 2025 |
From Schedule 13D and 13G filings: anyone owning more than 5% must file one.
What insiders did
In the last 12 months, 1 insider bought $845,620 of shares on the open market.
- Breber Pierre RDirectorBought
- Date
- 5 May 2026
- Shares
- 5,000
- Price
- $85.82
- Value
- $429,100
- Breber Pierre RDirectorBought
- Date
- 21 November 2025
- Shares
- 4,000
- Price
- $104.13
- Value
- $416,520
| Date | Who | Did | Shares | Price | Value |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 5 May 2026 | Breber Pierre R Director | Bought | 5,000 | $85.82 | $429,100 |
| 21 November 2025 | Breber Pierre R Director | Bought | 4,000 | $104.13 | $416,520 |
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.
We couldn’t fully check Clorox’s latest annual report.
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 couldn't fully read the 10-K filed 7 Aug 2026, so we can't say there are no warning signs.
One big customer
Worth knowingOne customer brings in a big share of sales: 26% last year. Losing that customer would hurt.
“Net sales to the Company’s largest customer, Walmart Stores, Inc. and its affiliates, were 26%, 27% and 25% of consolidated net sales for each of the fiscal years ended June 30, 2026, 2025 and 2024, respectively, and occurred across all of the Company’s reportable segments.”
From the 10-K filed 7 August 2026, Item 1. Business. Read it in the filing
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 carries a lot of debt: 7.9× its equity.
- Sales have barely grown: 1.1% a year.
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
Your first deep dive is free.
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.