Franklin Covey
FC on NYSE. Franklin Covey sells leadership and productivity training to individuals and organizations. Market value $196m.
Price checks use the past 12 months to May 2026. Quality checks use five annual reports, the latest for the year to August 2025.
We can't read total debt from the filing, so debt is left out.
Should I look at this?
Good business, but not cheap right now
Why it could be worth it
What to watch out for
See cheaper Industrials stocks on the list
This is not advice. Check the numbers below.
For every $100 of what the whole company costs, it produced $9.84 of spare cash in the past 12 months. A savings account pays about $4.
The filings do not give us enough to work this out.
The filings do not give us enough to work this out.
Quality score: 72 of 100. Price score: 56 of 100. Our list needs 70 on quality and 60 on price.
$17.35 a share, 55% above its 1-year low
Over the past year the price has ranged from $11.16 to $26.81.
Pays no dividend
Prices from Monday’s close (5 October).
Five years of cash, in billions
| Revenue | |||||
| Revenue | $224m | $263m | $281m | $287m | $267m |
| Operating margin | |||||
| Operating margin | 3.6% | 9.0% | 9.4% | 11.5% | 2.1% |
| Debt to equity | |||||
| Debt to equity | 0.40 | n/a | n/a | n/a | n/a |
| Shares outstanding | |||||
| Shares outstanding | 0.01bn | 0.01bn | 0.01bn | 0.01bn | 0.01bn |
Health checks
- Free cash flow positive5 of 5 years
- Accounting looks honest (Beneish)Not enough data
- Financial strength (Piotroski)5 of 7 checks we could run
- Profit backed by cash (accruals)No
- DebtUnknown
- Revenue growth, five yearsSlow, 6.1% a year
- Buying back its own sharesYes, 19% fewer since 2021
The quarter to May 2026
How the business did, compared with the same quarter a year earlier.
- Sales: $68 million last quarter, up 1% on a year ago.
- Profit: $3 million, after a loss of $1 million a year ago.
- It keeps 2 cents of each $1 of sales as operating profit, down from 6 cents a year earlier.
- Spare cash over the past 12 months: $19 million, down from $36 million.
- 11% fewer shares than a year ago. Each share owns a bit more of the company.
- Sales grew on a year ago in 2 of the last 4 quarters.
| Quarter to | Amount |
|---|---|
| August 2024 | $84m |
| November 2024 | $69m |
| February 2025 | $60m |
| May 2025 | $67m |
| August 2025 | $71m |
| November 2025 | $64m |
| February 2026 | $60m |
| May 2026 | $68m |
| Quarter to | Amount |
|---|---|
| August 2024 | $12m |
| November 2024 | $1m |
| February 2025 | -$1m |
| May 2025 | -$1m |
| August 2025 | $4m |
| November 2025 | -$3m |
| February 2026 | -$2m |
| May 2026 | $3m |
From the company's quarterly reports to the SEC.
Dates
- Next results (estimated)
- n/a
- Last annual report (10-K)
- 12 November 2025
- Next quarterly (estimated, 10-Q)
- 6 October 2026
Who owns it
1 long-term investor we follow owns it, unchanged from 1 last quarter. 113 funds in all.
| Fund | Value | Share of that fund | Change |
|---|---|---|---|
| Royce & AssociatesChuck Royce | $22m | 0.2% | Cut |
Largest holders overall
- BlackRock$24mAdded
- Royce & Associates$22mCut
- Alliancebernstein L.P.$17m
- Rice Hall James & Associates$12mCut
- Federated Hermes$11m
- Vanguard Capital Management$10mCut
- Geode Capital Management$7mAdded
- Dimensional Fund Advisors LP$7mCut
- State Street$6mCut
- Divisadero Street Capital Management, LP$5mNew
From 13F filings for the quarter ended 30 June 2026.
Big holders and activists
4 investors own more than 5%.
- AllianceBernstein L.P.Passive investor9.5%+1.2 ptsSince 31 December 2025
- Royce & AssociatesPassive investor7.8%−1.2 ptsSince 30 June 2026
- BlackRock, Inc.Passive investor6.1%Since 31 March 2025
- ASKELADDEN CAPITAL MANAGEMENT LLCPassive investorat least 3.1%−2.2 pts(filed with 1 related holder)Since 23 March 2026
- Punch & Associates Investment Management, Inc.Passive investorSold down below 5%Since 31 December 2024
- The Vanguard GroupPassive investorSold down below 5%Since 13 March 2026
| Holder | Stake | Since | |
|---|---|---|---|
AllianceBernstein L.P. Passive investor | 9.5%+1.2 pts | 31 December 2025 | |
Royce & Associates Passive investor | 7.8%−1.2 pts | 30 June 2026 | |
BlackRock, Inc. Passive investor | 6.1% | 31 March 2025 | |
ASKELADDEN CAPITAL MANAGEMENT LLC Passive investor | at least 3.1%−2.2 pts (filed with 1 related holder) | 23 March 2026 | |
Punch & Associates Investment Management, Inc. Passive investor | Sold down below 5% | 31 December 2024 | |
The Vanguard Group Passive investor | Sold down below 5% | 13 March 2026 |
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. 1 sold $102,760.
- Covey Michael Sean MerrillPresident, Education DivisionSold
- Date
- 10 November 2025
- Shares
- 7,000
- Price
- $14.68
- Value
- $102,760
| Date | Who | Did | Shares | Price | Value |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 10 November 2025 | Covey Michael Sean Merrill President, Education Division | Sold | 7,000 | $14.68 | $102,760 |
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 12 Nov 2025, plus the 10-Q filed 7 Jul 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.
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.