Forensic Analysis · Technology / Software · as of Sep 25, 2026
Braze, Inc. (BRZE)
A forensic read on Braze, Inc. built from its complete SEC filings — financial-health screens, earnings quality, red flags and a price-aware rating. Reproducible math, not opinion.
D · Weak — demands caution
Forensic grade
Safe
Financial health
4.2
Distress distance
Clean
Earnings quality
5
Forensic signals
-23.7
P / E (ttm)
-21.0%
ROE
$2.9B
Market cap
0.00%
Dividend yield
24.4%
Revenue growth
This free snapshot doesn't read filing or proxy text, so the auditor-quality and governance checks that can lower a grade were not evaluated (red flags, auditor quality, say on pay, board independence, going concern, valuation). Those checks only ever lower a grade, so the full analysis can land below the grade above but never above it — treat it as the most favourable reading, not the settled one.
Braze, Inc. earns a D (Weak — demands caution) forensic quality grade, and its balance-sheet distress test reads 4.2, placing it in the Safe zone. 5 forensic signals were flagged in its latest SEC filings, led by accruals ratio (% of noa).
What the filings flag
+24.3%
FY2025→FY2026
Accruals ratio (% of NOA).Net operating assets grew +24.3% relative to their own average in FY2026 — scaled by NOA itself, not by total assets, which is what the Forensic Screens card's own accrual row divides by. Accruals are building sharply — a large slice of profit sits in operating assets, not cash. An accrual is a claim that still has to be collected or written down, so the gap resolves in a later period whichever way it goes. The build is led by receivables up +28% against revenue +24% and payables paid down 27% against +32% in cost of sales. A cash-flow measure on the same base disagrees: reported earnings ran behind operating cash by 45% of net operating assets, against an accruals ratio of 24.3%. The two are computed differently: the accruals ratio is the change in net operating assets over average net operating assets, while the cash-flow figure is net income less operating cash flow over that same average. Read them as two results, not one.
-20.1%
FY2026
Return on invested capital.Return on invested capital is -20.1% in the latest fiscal year and rising across FY2024–FY2026 from -25.2%. After-tax operating profit was ($114M) in FY2024 and ($114M) in FY2026, with operating income at -30.7% of revenue in FY2024, -20.6% in FY2025 and -19.6% in FY2026. The capital base behind it grew +26% across FY2024–FY2026, from $453M to $569M, and the return did not fall doing it, so the dollars added over that window earned at least the -25.2% the older base was already earning.
+4.9%/yr
FY2024–FY2026
Share-count dilution.Diluted share count changed +10% over the last 2 years to FY2026 (+4.9%/yr). The count is growing: more stock was issued than repurchased over this window, so aggregate results grew faster than their per-share equivalents. That's ~4.9% shaved off per-share growth every year — total profit has to grow that much just to keep earnings-per-share flat, and a stake held since FY2024 has been diluted ~9%.
Key fundamentals
Latest Revenue$738.2M
Revenue Growth YoY+24.4%
Revenue CAGR (2yr)+25.1%
Net Margin-17.8%
Free Cash Flow$58.1M
Return on Equity-21.0%
The forensic grade and screens above are free — no account needed. Want the AI investment read on top — the 0–100 rating, thesis, bull-vs-bear, red flags and the 12-month scenario, written from Braze, Inc.'s actual 10-K/10-Q/8-K filings?
Data from SEC EDGAR public filings · metrics as of Sep 25, 2026. Forensic signals flag probability, not certainty.
19% of rev
FY2026
Stock-based comp load.Stock-based compensation ran 19% of revenue and 248% of free cash flow in FY2026 — about $1.33 per diluted share. No cash left the business to pay it, which is why operating cash flow adds it back. Net of repurchases the diluted count still rose about 4.9% a year and that rate is not falling, so total profit has to grow by that much annually before any of it reaches a share. Stock compensation is one source of that issuance; acquisition consideration, equity raises, convertibles and other employee plans also net into the count, and these figures do not separate them.
FCF ($6M)
FY2024
Shareholder returns.Returned $165,000 to shareholders (buybacks + dividends) in FY2024, but free cash flow was ($6M) after capex — there was no free cash flow to fund the payout from at all, though operating cash flow alone was $7M — 2% of that. The entire return is coming from debt or cash reserves, not cash the business itself generated — a harder case than returns merely running ahead of free cash flow, since here there was none to run ahead of.
Braze, Inc. (BRZE) Stock — Forensic Analysis, Red Flags & Rating | Stockonomy · Stockonomy