Forensic Analysis · General / Diversified · as of Aug 11, 2026

Steven Madden, Ltd. (SHOO)

A forensic read on Steven Madden, Ltd. 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

Safe

Financial health

8.6

Distress distance

Clean

Earnings quality

Forensic signals

24.7

P / E (ttm)

5.2%

ROE

$3.6B

Market cap

1.74%

Dividend yield

11.0%

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 (red flags, auditor quality, say on pay, board independence). 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.

Steven Madden, Ltd. earns a D (Weak — demands caution) forensic quality grade, and its balance-sheet distress test reads 8.6, placing it in the Safe zone. 3 forensic signals were flagged in its latest SEC filings, led by accruals ratio (% of noa).

What the filings flag

+39.7%

FY2024→FY2025

Accruals ratio (% of NOA). Net operating assets grew +39.7% relative to their own average in FY2025 — scaled by NOA itself, not total assets (see the Forensic Screens card's differently-scaled Sloan Accrual Ratio for that read). Accruals are building sharply — a large slice of profit sits in operating assets, not cash; Richardson/Sloan link high accruals to weaker future returns as they reverse. The build is led by inventory up +62% against +10% in cost of sales. The cash-flow cross-check is more mixed: reported earnings ran behind operating cash by 14% of net operating assets, diverging from the balance-sheet accrual read.

83d

FY2024→FY2025

Inventory days. Days inventory outstanding moved from 66 to 83 FY2024→FY2025 (against cost of goods sold; inventory +62% vs +10% in cost of sales). Inventory is outrunning what's being sold — a flag for softening demand or obsolescence risk ahead.

4.1%

FY2025

Return on invested capital. Return on invested capital is 4.1% in the latest fiscal year and slipping from 33% — well below its ~9% cost of capital, so reinvested dollars may be destroying value, not building it.

Key fundamentals

Latest Revenue$2.53B

Revenue Growth YoY+11.0%

Revenue CAGR (3yr)+6.1%

Net Margin1.8%

Free Cash Flow$119.5M

Return on Equity5.2%

Debt / Equity0.27x

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Data from SEC EDGAR public filings · metrics as of Aug 11, 2026. Forensic signals flag probability, not certainty.