Forensic Analysis · Retail / Consumer Discretionary · as of Sep 25, 2026
Stitch Fix, Inc. (SFIX)
A forensic read on Stitch Fix, 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
-0.7
Distress distance
Clean
Earnings quality
5
Forensic signals
-21.5
P / E (ttm)
-6.4%
ROE
$412M
Market cap
0.00%
Dividend yield
6.4%
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.
Stitch Fix, Inc. earns a D (Weak — demands caution) forensic quality grade, and its balance-sheet distress test reads -0.7, 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
-11.5%
FY2026
Return on invested capital.Return on invested capital is -11.5% in the latest fiscal year and rising across FY2024–FY2026 from -87.5%. After-tax operating profit was ($105M) in FY2024 and ($17M) in FY2026, with operating income at -10.0% of revenue in FY2024, -3.1% in FY2025 and -1.6% in FY2026. The capital base behind it grew +23% across FY2024–FY2026, from $120M to $148M, and the return did not fall doing it, so the dollars added over that window earned at least the -87.5% the older base was already earning. FY2024's operating profit carried a $19M asset write-down and a $15M restructuring charge that alone took about 22.2 points off that year's return, so about 22.2 of the 76.0-point rise across FY2024–FY2026 is that charge leaving the base year rather than the capital earning more.
+5.7%/yr
FY2024–FY2026
Share-count dilution.Diluted share count changed +12% over the last 2 years to FY2026 (+5.7%/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 ~5.7% 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 FY2024 has been diluted ~10%.
+12.4%
FY2025→FY2026
Accruals ratio (% of NOA).Net operating assets grew +12.4% relative to their own average in FY2026 — 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. A cash-flow measure on the same base disagrees: reported earnings ran behind operating cash by 54% of net operating assets, against an accruals ratio of 12.4%. 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.
Key fundamentals
Latest Revenue$1.35B
Revenue Growth YoY+6.4%
Revenue CAGR (2yr)+0.4%
Net Margin-0.9%
Free Cash Flow$19.8M
Return on Equity-6.4%
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 Stitch Fix, 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.
3% of rev
FY2026
Stock-based comp load.Stock-based compensation ran 3% of revenue and 234% of free cash flow in FY2026 — about $0.35 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 5.7% a year, 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.
133% of FCF
FY2026
Shareholder returns.Returned $26M to shareholders (buybacks + dividends) in FY2026 — 133% of free cash flow, but 68% 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 $46M of stock-based comp paid out in shares on top of that, the combined claim on free cash flow is 367%.
Stitch Fix, Inc. (SFIX) Stock — Forensic Analysis, Red Flags & Rating | Stockonomy · Stockonomy