Forensic Analysis · Healthcare / Pharmaceuticals / Biotech · as of Sep 29, 2026
Lifecore Biomedical, Inc. \De\ (LFCR)
A forensic read on Lifecore Biomedical, Inc. \De\ built from its complete SEC filings — financial-health screens, earnings quality, red flags and a price-aware rating. Reproducible math, not opinion.
F · Poor — capital at risk
Forensic grade
Distress
Financial health
-1.8
Distress distance
Clean
Earnings quality
4
Forensic signals
0.5%
Revenue growth
The financial-health reading above compares this company's equity at BOOK value, not at what the market currently pays for it — this free snapshot doesn't pull live market data. Treat it as a rough read, not the final word.
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.
Lifecore Biomedical, Inc. \De\ earns an F (Poor — capital at risk) forensic quality grade, and its balance-sheet distress test reads -1.8, placing it in the Distress zone (based on book value, not market value, since this free snapshot doesn't pull live market data — treat this zone as a rough read, not the final word). 4 forensic signals were flagged in its latest SEC filings, led by return on invested capital.
What the filings flag
-6.7%
FY2025
Return on invested capital.Return on invested capital is -6.7% in the latest fiscal year, against -8.8% in FY2023, having run between -8.8% and -3.8% across FY2023–FY2025 with no direction held. After-tax operating profit was ($17M) in FY2023 and ($14M) in FY2025, with operating income at -21.1% of revenue in FY2023, -6.9% in FY2024 and -13.4% in FY2025. The capital base behind it went from $196M in FY2023 to $204M in FY2025 (+4%), while the revenue it carried went from $103M to $129M.
+7.8%/yr
FY2023–FY2025
Share-count dilution.Diluted share count changed +16% over the last 2 years to FY2025 (+7.8%/yr). The count is growing — 30.0M shares in FY2023, 34.8M in FY2025: more stock was issued than repurchased over this window, so aggregate results grew faster than their per-share equivalents. That's ~7.8% 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 ~14%.
+16.1%
FY2024→FY2025
Accruals ratio (% of NOA).Net operating assets grew +16.1% 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. The build is led by payables paid down 50% against +2% in cost of sales. A cash-flow measure on the same base disagrees: reported earnings ran behind operating cash by 24% of net operating assets, against an accruals ratio of 16.1%. 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.
8% of rev
Key fundamentals
Latest Revenue$128.9M
Revenue Growth YoY+0.5%
Revenue CAGR (2yr)+11.8%
Net Margin-30.0%
Free Cash Flow-$13.6M
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 Lifecore Biomedical, Inc. \De\'s actual 10-K/10-Q/8-K filings?
Data from SEC EDGAR public filings · metrics as of Sep 29, 2026. Forensic signals flag probability, not certainty.
Lifecore Biomedical, Inc. \De\ (LFCR) Stock — Forensic Analysis, Red Flags & Rating | Stockonomy · Stockonomy
FY2025
Stock-based comp load.Stock-based compensation ran 8% of revenue in FY2025 — about $0.29 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 7.8% 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.