A forensic read on Formfactor 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
Safe
Financial health
8.8
Distress distance
Clean
Earnings quality
3
Forensic signals
5.5%
ROE
2.8%
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.
Formfactor Inc earns a C (Mixed — selective) forensic quality grade, and its balance-sheet distress test reads 8.8, placing it in the Safe zone. 3 forensic signals were flagged in its latest SEC filings, led by return on invested capital.
What the filings flag
5.1%
FY2025
Return on invested capital.Return on invested capital is 5.1% in the latest fiscal year and slipping across FY2023–FY2025 from 9.3%. After-tax operating profit was $74M in FY2023 and $46M in FY2025, with operating income at 12.5% of revenue in FY2023, 8.5% in FY2024 and 7.3% in FY2025. The capital base behind it grew +14% across FY2023–FY2025, from $799M to $912M, while the return fell 4.2 points, so the dollars added over that window earned less than the 9.3% the older base was already earning. $171M of the $912M base at FY2025 is short-term investments (18.7%) — securities held beside cash, which the base keeps because only cash is subtracted from it; they earn the balance sheet's yield, which is not in the operating profit above, so this rate understates what the operating capital earns.
+17.6%
FY2024→FY2025
Accruals ratio (% of NOA).Net operating assets grew +17.6% relative to their own average in FY2025 — scaled by NOA itself, not by total assets, which is what the Forensic Screens card's own accrual row divides by. Accruals are building faster than is comfortable — part of profit is sitting in the balance sheet rather than turning to cash. Net operating assets also rose $22.8M through acquisitions (increase in goodwill and intangibles); that purchase is investing and is excluded from this ratio. The build is led by payables paid down 24% against +4% in cost of sales and PP&E up +23% against revenue +3%. A cash-flow measure on the same base disagrees: reported earnings ran behind operating cash by 7% of net operating assets, against an accruals ratio of 17.6%. 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.Accruals ratio: the year-over-year change in net operating assets, relative to their own average.NOA (net operating assets): the money tied up in running the business, operating assets minus operating liabilities.
224% of FCF
FY2025
Shareholder returns.Returned $26M to shareholders (buybacks + dividends) in FY2025 — 224% of free cash flow, but 23% of operating cash flow. Returns run ahead of free cash flow because the business is also funding heavy growth capex (usually debt-financed); the payout itself is covered by operating cash — sustainable as long as that spending is genuine expansion, not upkeep. Counting the $39M of stock-based comp paid out in shares on top of that, the combined claim on free cash flow is 552%.
Key fundamentals
Latest Revenue$785.0M
Revenue Growth YoY+2.8%
Revenue CAGR (2yr)+8.8%
Net Margin6.9%
Free Cash Flow$11.7M
Return on Equity5.5%
Debt / Equity0.01x
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 Formfactor Inc's actual 10-K/10-Q/8-K filings?