Forensic Analysis · General / Diversified · as of Nov 8, 2026
Casella Waste Systems Inc (CWST)
A forensic read on Casella Waste Systems Inc built from its complete SEC filings — financial-health screens, earnings quality, red flags and a price-aware rating. Reproducible math, not opinion.
C · Mixed — selective
Forensic grade
Grey Zone
Financial health
1.1
Distress distance
Clean
Earnings quality
3
Forensic signals
0.5%
ROE
18.0%
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 (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.
Casella Waste Systems Inc earns a C (Mixed — selective) forensic quality grade, and its balance-sheet distress test reads 1.1, placing it in the Grey zone. 3 forensic signals were flagged in its latest SEC filings, led by return on invested capital.
What the filings flag
1.5%
FY2025
Return on invested capital.Return on invested capital is 1.5% in the latest fiscal year and steady across FY2023–FY2025, inside a 1.2-point range. After-tax operating profit was $55M in FY2023 and $41M in FY2025, with operating income at 6.4% of revenue in FY2023, 4.7% in FY2024 and 3.5% in FY2025. The capital base behind it grew +33% across FY2023–FY2025, from $2.1B to $2.8B, while the return fell 1.2 points, so the dollars added over that window earned less than the 2.7% the older base was already earning.
+7.2%/yr
FY2023–FY2025
Share-count dilution.Diluted share count changed +15% over the last 2 years to FY2025 (+7.2%/yr). The count is growing — 55.3M shares in FY2023, 63.6M in FY2025: more stock was issued than repurchased over this window, so aggregate results grew faster than their per-share equivalents. That's ~7.2% 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 ~13%.
0.8% of rev
FY2025
Stock-based comp load.Stock-based compensation ran 0.8% of revenue and 17% of free cash flow in FY2025 — about $0.22 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 7.2% a year across FY2023–FY2025, and the rate is falling. 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$1.84B
Revenue Growth YoY+18.0%
Revenue CAGR (2yr)+20.5%
Net Margin0.4%
Free Cash Flow$84.7M
Return on Equity0.5%
Debt / Equity0.74x
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