Eli Lilly & Co (LLY) Stock — Forensic Analysis, Red Flags & Rating | Stockonomy · Stockonomy
Forensic Analysis · Healthcare / Pharmaceuticals / Biotech · as of Sep 11, 2026
Eli Lilly & Co (LLY)
A forensic read on Eli Lilly & Co 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
16.0
Distress distance
Clean
Earnings quality
5
Forensic signals
39.9
P / E (ttm)
77.8%
ROE
$1.1T
Market cap
0.75%
Dividend yield
44.7%
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 (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.
Eli Lilly & Co earns a C (Mixed — selective) forensic quality grade, and its balance-sheet distress test reads 16.0, placing it in the Safe zone. 5 forensic signals were flagged in its latest SEC filings, led by accruals ratio (% of noa).
What the filings flag
+32.2%
FY2024→FY2025
Accruals ratio (% of NOA).Net operating assets grew +32.2% 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 sharply — a large slice of profit sits in operating assets, not cash. An accrual is a claim that still has to be collected or written down, so the gap resolves in a later period whichever way it goes. The build is led by inventory up +81% against +31% in cost of sales and receivables up +61% against revenue +45%. This is the seventh straight fiscal year of building accruals — an even longer streak than the 3-year mark that already signals a materially stronger tell. A cash-flow measure on the same base agrees: reported earnings ran ahead of operating cash by 7% of net operating assets, against an accruals ratio of 32.2%. 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.
352d
FY2024→FY2025
Inventory days.Days inventory outstanding moved from 290 to 352 FY2024→FY2025 (against cost of goods sold; inventory +81% vs +31% in cost of sales). Inventory is outrunning what's being sold — a flag for softening demand or obsolescence risk ahead.
0.82×
FY2023–FY2025
Cash conversion.Over FY2023–FY2025, cumulative operating cash flow was 0.82× cumulative net income. Cash is lagging reported profit. The shortfall is profit tied up in working capital rather than collected — the accrual and receivables lines below show where.
-0.2%/yr
FY2022–FY2025
Share count.Diluted share count changed -1% over the last 3 years to FY2025 (-0.2%/yr). Roughly flat — buybacks ($4.1B) are about offsetting stock comp ($626M), not shrinking the count. Per-share value isn't being meaningfully helped or hurt by the count.
Key fundamentals
Net Margin31.7%
Debt / Equity1.60x
Free Cash Flow$8.97B
Latest Revenue$65.18B
Return on Equity77.8%
Revenue CAGR (3yr)+31.7%
Revenue Growth YoY+44.7%
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 Eli Lilly & Co's actual 10-K/10-Q/8-K filings?
Data from SEC EDGAR public filings · metrics as of Sep 11, 2026. Forensic signals flag probability, not certainty.
106% of FCF
FY2025
Shareholder returns.Returned $9.5B to shareholders (buybacks + dividends) in FY2025 — 106% of free cash flow. Right at the limit of what free cash flow covers — little room before it's funded by debt or the balance sheet. That ratio has been CLIMBING toward the limit — 88% of free cash flow a few years back — not just sitting there. Counting the $626M of stock-based comp paid out in shares on top of that, the combined claim on free cash flow is 113%.