Forensic Analysis · Healthcare Providers & Services · as of Nov 12, 2026
Starling Oncology, Inc. (STLN)
A forensic read on Starling Oncology, Inc. built from its complete SEC filings — financial-health screens, earnings quality, red flags and a quality and risk rating. Reproducible math, not opinion.
D · Weak — demands caution
Forensic grade
Distress
Financial health
-5.3
Distress distance
Clean
Earnings quality
5
Forensic signals
27.8%
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 (auditor quality, say on pay, board independence, going concern). 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.
Starling Oncology, Inc. earns a D (Weak — demands caution) forensic quality grade, and its balance-sheet distress test reads -5.3, 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
-43.5%
FY2025
Return on invested capital.Return on invested capital is -43.5% in the latest fiscal year, against -43.2% in FY2023, having run between -44.8% and -43.2% across FY2023–FY2025 with no direction held. After-tax operating profit was ($61M) in FY2023 and ($29M) in FY2025, with operating income at -23.8% of revenue in FY2023, -15.3% in FY2024 and -7.2% in FY2025. The capital base behind it came down -54% across FY2023–FY2025, from $141M to $65M, so this return is struck on a smaller base than it started on. FY2023's operating profit carried a $17M goodwill write-off that alone took about 9.5 points off that year's return, so the FY2025 return is being compared with a base year that charge had already pulled down. A non-cash write-down lowers the reported return in the year it lands.
+11.9%/yr
FY2023–FY2025
Share-count dilution.Diluted share count changed +25% over the last 2 years to FY2025 (+11.9%/yr). The count is growing — 73.7M shares in FY2023, 92.4M in FY2025: more stock was issued than repurchased over this window, so aggregate results grew faster than their per-share equivalents. That's ~11.9% 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 ~20%.
0.9% of rev
FY2025
Stock-based comp load.Stock-based compensation ran 0.9% of revenue in FY2025 — about $0.05 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 11.9% a year across FY2023–FY2025 and that rate is not falling, so total profit has to grow by that much annually before any of it reaches a share. 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.
stopped
FY2023→FY2024
Shareholder returns — halted.Capital returns have STOPPED — $1M of buybacks + dividends in FY2023, but ~$0 in FY2024. A halt usually means the company is conserving cash.
$17M
FY2023
Goodwill impairments.Took $17M of goodwill writedowns across 1 year (FY2023 ($17M)). Writedowns mean past acquisitions underperformed what was paid for them.
Key fundamentals
Latest Revenue$502.7M
Revenue Growth YoY+27.8%
Revenue CAGR (2yr)+24.5%
Net Margin-12.1%
Free Cash Flow-$27.8M
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 Starling Oncology, Inc.'s actual 10-K/10-Q/8-K filings?