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Kelly Services

KELYA on Nasdaq. Kelly provides staffing and workforce services to employers. Market value $364m.

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

Why it could be worth it

What to watch out for

See Technology stocks that passed both tests

This is not advice. Check the numbers below.

Compare with another stock

Cash yield
annual report to December 2025
20.9%very high

For every $100 of what the whole company costs, it produced $20.89 of spare cash last year. A savings account pays about $4.

Price to profit
past 12 months to June 2026
n/a

The filings do not give us enough to work this out.

Return on capital
five annual reports to December 2025
-0.8%five-year median

Each dollar kept in the business earns -1 cents a year. Above 10 is good.

Quality score: 36 of 100. Price score: 33 of 100. Our list needs 70 on quality and 60 on price.

$15.56 a share, 95% above its 1-year low

Over the past year the price has ranged from $7.98 to $17.75.

Dividend: 2.0% a year

Paid every year for at least 5 years

Prices from Tuesday’s close (6 October).

Five years of cash, in billions

0.1
-0.1
0.1
0.0
0.1
20212022202320242025
Revenue
$4.9bn$5.0bn$4.8bn$4.3bn$4.3bn
Operating margin
1.0%0.3%0.5%-0.3%-1.6%
Debt to equity
n/an/a0.000.190.10
Shares outstanding
0.04bn0.04bn0.04bn0.04bn0.04bn

Health checks

  • Free cash flow positive4 of 5 years
  • Accounting looks honest (Beneish)Nothing unusual
  • Financial strength (Piotroski)4 of 8 checks we could run
  • Profit backed by cash (accruals)No
  • Debt0.10× equity
  • Revenue growth, five yearsShrinking, 1.2% a year
  • Buying back its own sharesYes, 11% fewer since 2021

The quarter to June 2026

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

  • Sales: $1 billion last quarter, down 6% on a year ago.
  • Profit: $11 million, down 40% on a year ago.
  • It loses 2 cents on each $1 of sales, after keeping 0 cents a year earlier.
  • 1% fewer shares than a year ago. Each share owns a bit more of the company.
  • Debt is $54 million more than cash, down from $56 million a year ago.
  • 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$1.0bn
December 2024$1.2bn
March 2025$1.2bn
June 2025$1.1bn
September 2025$935m
December 2025$1.0bn
March 2026$1.0bn
June 2026$1.0bn
Profit by quarter
Profit by quarter
Quarter toAmount
September 2024$800,000
December 2024-$32m
March 2025$6m
June 2025$19m
September 2025-$150m
December 2025-$129m
March 2026-$6m
June 2026$11m

From the company's quarterly reports to the SEC.

Dates

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

Who owns it

3 long-term investors we follow own it, unchanged from 3 last quarter. 168 funds in all.

Jun '25
Dec '25
Jun '26

Sold out this quarter

Largest holders overall

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

Big holders and activists

5 investors own more than 5%.

  • Hunt Equity Opportunities, LLC
    at least 92.2%0.0 pts
    (filed with 7 related holders)
    Since 19 May 2026
    What they said

    Item 4 of the Original Schedule 13D is hereby amended and supplemented by adding the following: The Reporting Persons have requested that the Board of Directors of the Issuer (the "Board") form a special committee of independent and disinterested directors (the "Special…

    Read the filing
  • David M. Hempstead
    92.2%
    Since 28 March 2025
    What they said

    On March 28, 2025, Trust K gifted 100,000 shares of Class B Stock to a charitable foundation (the "Gifted Shares"). None of the Reporting Persons retain ongoing voting or dispositive power over the Gifted Shares. The Reporting Persons do not have any present plans or proposals…

    Read the filing
  • BlackRock, Inc.
    Passive investor
    7.2%−1.5 pts
    Since 30 June 2025
  • Barclays PLC
    Passive investor
    5.8%−1.6 pts
    Since 30 June 2025
  • Liechtensteinische Landesbank Aktiengesellschaft
    Passive investor
    at least 5.1%
    (filed with 1 related holder)
    Since 31 March 2026
  • Andrew H. Curoe
    Passive investor
    Sold down below 5%
    Since 30 January 2026
    What they said

    On January 9, 2026, Trust K entered into a Share Purchase Agreement (the "Purchase Agreement") with Hunt Equity Opportunities, LLC (the "Purchaser"), pursuant to which Trust K agreed to sell to the Purchaser 3,039,940 shares of Class B Stock (representing all of the shares of…

    Read the filing
  • The Vanguard Group
    Passive investor
    Sold down below 5%
    Since 13 March 2026
  • Boston Partners
    Passive investor
    Sold down below 5%
    Since 31 December 2025

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 $327,209 of shares on the open market. 2 sold $293,793.

  • Williams Vanessa Peterson
    EVP, Gen Counsel & Corp Sec
    Sold
    Date
    14 May 2026
    Shares
    29,999
    Price
    $9.78
    Value
    $293,392
  • Layden Christopher D.
    President, and CEO
    Bought
    Date
    24 March 2026
    Shares
    10,100
    Price
    $8.81
    Value
    $88,952
  • Brock-Kyle Angela
    Director
    Bought
    Date
    4 March 2026
    Shares
    100
    Price
    $14.77
    Value
    $1,477
  • Hunt James Christopher
    Director
    Bought
    Date
    25 February 2026
    Shares
    4,000
    Price
    $9.30
    Value
    $37,200
  • Hunt James Christopher
    Director
    Bought
    Date
    23 February 2026
    Shares
    10,000
    Price
    $9.43
    Value
    $94,300
  • Hunt James Christopher
    Director
    Bought
    Date
    20 February 2026
    Shares
    10,000
    Price
    $9.57
    Value
    $95,700
  • Hunt James Christopher
    Director
    Bought
    Date
    18 February 2026
    Shares
    1,000
    Price
    $9.58
    Value
    $9,580
  • MURPHY LESLIE A
    Director
    Sold
    Date
    24 December 2025
    Shares
    47
    Price
    $8.52
    Value
    $400

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 Feb 2026, plus the 10-Q filed 6 Aug 2026 and 3 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

  • Sales have shrunk: 1.2% 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
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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.