Southern Co (SO) Stock — Forensic Analysis, Red Flags & Rating | Stockonomy · Stockonomy
Forensic Analysis · Utilities · as of Sep 24, 2026
Southern Co (SO)
A forensic read on Southern Co 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
Grey Zone
Financial health
1.2
Distress distance
Clean
Earnings quality
3
Forensic signals
21.1
P / E (ttm)
12.1%
ROE
$96.0B
Market cap
4.02%
Dividend yield
10.6%
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.
Southern Co earns a D (Weak — demands caution) forensic quality grade, and its balance-sheet distress test reads 1.2, placing it in the Grey zone. 3 forensic signals were flagged in its latest SEC filings, led by shareholder returns.
What the filings flag
FCF ($2.9B)
FY2025
Shareholder returns.Returned $3.0B to shareholders (buybacks + dividends) in FY2025, but free cash flow was ($2.9B) after capex — there was no free cash flow to fund the payout from at all, though operating cash flow alone was $9.8B — 31% of that. The entire return is coming from debt or cash reserves, not cash the business itself generated — a harder case than returns merely running ahead of free cash flow, since here there was none to run ahead of.
4.4%
FY2025
Return on invested capital.Return on invested capital is 4.4% in the latest fiscal year and rising across FY2021–FY2025 from 3% — slightly below the ~6% cost of capital we hold this sector to — reinvestment to date is roughly a wash. The capital base behind it grew +19% across FY2021–FY2025, from $116.3B to $137.9B, and the return did not fall doing it, so the dollars added over that window earned at least the 3% the older base was already earning.
+0.9%/yr
FY2022–FY2025
Share count.Diluted share count changed +3% over the last 3 years to FY2025 (+0.9%/yr). Roughly flat — the count is neither shrinking nor growing meaningfully. Per-share value isn't being meaningfully helped or hurt by the count.
Key fundamentals
Latest Revenue$29.55B
Revenue Growth YoY+10.6%
Revenue CAGR (3yr)+0.3%
Net Margin14.7%
Free Cash Flow-$2.94B
Return on Equity12.1%
Debt / Equity1.84x
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 Southern Co's actual 10-K/10-Q/8-K filings?