Forensic Analysis · Refining & Downstream · as of Nov 9, 2026
Conocophillips (COP)
A forensic read on Conocophillips built from its complete SEC filings — financial-health screens, earnings quality, red flags and a price-aware rating. Reproducible math, not opinion.
B · Sound & dependable
Forensic grade
Safe
Financial health
3.9
Distress distance
Clean
Earnings quality
5
Forensic signals
12.4%
ROE
7.7%
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 (auditor quality, say on pay, board independence, going concern). 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.
Conocophillips earns a B (Sound & dependable) forensic quality grade, and its balance-sheet distress test reads 3.9, placing it in the Safe zone. 5 forensic signals were flagged in its latest SEC filings, led by return on invested capital.
What the filings flag
8.5%
FY2025
Return on invested capital.Return on invested capital is 8.5% in the latest fiscal year and slipping across FY2023–FY2025 from 14.1%. After-tax operating profit was $11.5B in FY2023 and $9.0B in FY2025. The capital base behind it grew +29% across FY2023–FY2025, from $81.4B to $105.3B, while the return fell 5.6 points, so the dollars added over that window earned less than the 14.1% the older base was already earning.
+2.0%/yr
FY2023–FY2025
Share-count dilution.Diluted share count changed +4% over the last 2 years to FY2025 (+2.0%/yr). The count is growing — 1,205.7M shares in FY2023, 1,253.4M in FY2025: more stock was issued than repurchased over this window, so aggregate results grew faster than their per-share equivalents. That's ~2.0% 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 FY2023 has been diluted ~4%.
0.6% of rev
FY2025
Stock-based comp load.Stock-based compensation ran 0.6% of revenue and 5% of free cash flow in FY2025 — about $0.27 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 2.0% a year across FY2023–FY2025 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.
124% of FCF
FY2025
Shareholder returns.Returned $9.0B to shareholders (buybacks + dividends) in FY2025 — 124% of free cash flow, but 46% of operating cash flow. Returns run ahead of free cash flow, with the gap funded by debt or cash reserves rather than the cash the business itself throws off; the payout itself is still covered by operating cash. Counting the $336M of stock-based comp paid out in shares on top of that, the combined claim on free cash flow is 129%.
-33%
FY2023→FY2024
Dividend — cut.The payout was CUT ~33% in FY2024 (from FY2023). It still returns some cash, but it is NOT the dependable, rising dividend an unbroken streak implies.
Key fundamentals
Latest Revenue$58.94B
Revenue Growth YoY+7.7%
Revenue CAGR (2yr)+2.5%
Net Margin13.6%
Free Cash Flow$7.24B
Return on Equity12.4%
Debt / Equity0.36x
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 Conocophillips's actual 10-K/10-Q/8-K filings?