Forensic Analysis · Technology / Software · as of Sep 25, 2026
Cerence Inc. (CRNC)
A forensic read on Cerence 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
Distress
Financial health
-3.2
Distress distance
Clean
Earnings quality
5
Forensic signals
-21.3
P / E (ttm)
-12.4%
ROE
$365M
Market cap
0.00%
Dividend yield
-24.0%
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.
Cerence Inc. earns a D (Weak — demands caution) forensic quality grade, and its balance-sheet distress test reads -3.2, placing it in the Distress zone. 5 forensic signals were flagged in its latest SEC filings, led by return on invested capital.
What the filings flag
-0.3%
FY2025
Return on invested capital.Return on invested capital is -0.3% in the latest fiscal year, against -1.9% in FY2023, having run between -80.0% and -0.3% across FY2023–FY2025 with no direction held. After-tax operating profit was ($21M) in FY2023 and ($2M) in FY2025, with operating income at -9.2% of revenue in FY2023, -174.9% in FY2024 and -0.9% in FY2025. The capital base behind it cannot be compared across FY2023–FY2025: short-term debt is tagged in one of those two fiscal years and not the other, and an untagged line enters this calculation as zero, so any change in the base would be a change in what the filer tagged. FY2024's operating profit carried a $609M goodwill write-off that alone took about 84.0 points off that year's return; FY2024 sits between the two ends of FY2023–FY2025, so the charge shapes the path between them without moving the change across it.
+3.6%/yr
FY2023–FY2025
Share-count dilution.Diluted share count changed +7% over the last 2 years to FY2025 (+3.6%/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 ~3.6% 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 ~7%.
11% of rev
FY2025
Stock-based comp load.Stock-based compensation ran 11% of revenue and 58% of free cash flow in FY2025 — about $0.63 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 3.6% 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.
Key fundamentals
Latest Revenue$251.8M
Revenue Growth YoY-24.0%
Revenue CAGR (2yr)-7.5%
Net Margin-7.4%
Free Cash Flow$46.8M
Return on Equity-12.4%
Debt / Equity1.33x
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 Cerence 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.
Cerence Inc. (CRNC) Stock — Forensic Analysis, Red Flags & Rating | Stockonomy · Stockonomy
85d DSO
FY2024→FY2025
Receivables vs revenue.Days sales outstanding moved from 69 to 85 days FY2024→FY2025 (receivables -6% vs revenue -24%). Receivables are creeping up relative to sales. Across FY2023–FY2025 the day count ran 76 → 69 → 85 days, so the latest reading sits on top of a record that was flat or falling before it — one year's move, not a direction the business has been travelling in. Both figures are measured on period-end balances rather than the beginning-plus-ending average, because averaging needs the balance a year before every reading — FY2024's opening balance is on file, but across the 3 fiscal years read here (FY2023–FY2025) the average yields only 2 day counts (1 step), too few to tell a climb from one year's move.
$609M
FY2024–FY2024
Goodwill impairments.Took $609M of goodwill writedowns across 1 year (FY2024 ($609M)). Writedowns mean past acquisitions underperformed what was paid for them.