BRK-B · Financials(fire, marine & casualty insurance) · 10 years of annual accounts filed with the SEC · latest fiscal year ended 2025-12-31
Berkshire Hathaway Inc reported revenue of $247.2 billion in fiscal 2025, after growing 0.3% a year over the previous 9 years. Its operating margin widened from 11.8% in 2017 to 35.4%. Of the $364.1 billion its operations generated over 10 years, 39.4% went back into the business and 21.4% to buybacks. On the accounting screens, it passes 2 of 5 Piotroski tests; 1 of the six cross-checks between its statements fires.
Revenue, fiscal 2025247.2B+0.3% a year over 9 years
Operating margin35.4%gross margin —
Return on invested capital—
Free cash flow25.0B10.1% of revenue
Net debt ÷ EBITDA—net debt —
Piotroski F-score2/5tests of improvement passed
Is it growing?
Revenue and the operating income it turns into. Growth that does not reach operating income is growth bought with margin.
RevenueOperating income
-100.0B0100.0B200.0B300.0B
2017Revenue 239.9BOperating income 28.2B
2018Revenue 175.4BOperating income 7.9B
2019Revenue 176.5BOperating income 106.7B
2020Revenue 166.7BOperating income 59.8B
2021
2021Revenue 191.3BOperating income 116.0B
2022Revenue 207.8BOperating income -26.1B
2023Revenue 254.9BOperating income 125.2B
2024Revenue 249.7BOperating income 115.6B
2025Revenue 247.2BOperating income 87.5B
2017201820192020202120212022202320242025
Compound growth a year
3 yrs
5 yrs
9 yrs
Revenue
+6.0%
—
+0.3%
Operating income
—
—
+13.4%
Net income
—
—
+4.5%
Falling shares are buybacks: each remaining share owns more of the company.
Does it earn more than its capital costs?
Margins say how much of each sale is kept; return on invested capital says how much the business earns on the money it needs to operate. Growth only creates value when that return is above the cost of the capital.
Needs a cost of capital, which comes from the valuation below.
Return on equity
9.3%
Return on assets
5.5%
Asset turnover
0.20×
Is the profit cash, and where does the cash go?
Net income is an accounting opinion; free cash flow is what was left in the bank after investing. Stock-based pay does not leave the bank — shareholders pay it through dilution — so it is shown taken off as well.
Net incomeFree cash flowAfter stock-based pay
-50.0B050.0B100.0B
2017Net income 44.9BFree cash flow 34.0B
2018Net income 4.0BFree cash flow 22.9B
2019Net income 81.4BFree cash flow 22.7B
2020Net income 42.5BFree cash flow 26.8B
2021
2021Net income 89.9BFree cash flow 26.2B
2022Net income -22.8BFree cash flow 21.9B
2023Net income 96.2BFree cash flow 29.8B
2024Net income 89.0BFree cash flow 11.6B
2025Net income 67.0BFree cash flow 25.0B
2017201820192020202120212022202320242025
Where 10 years of operating cash went, 2017–2025
364.1B generated by the business. Each band is its share of that total.
Reinvested in the business 39%143.3B
Acquisitions 9%31.3B
Dividends 0%0
Share buybacks 21%77.9B
Kept, or used to pay down debt 31%111.6B
Per share
Shares outstanding
How strong is the balance sheet?
Debt is not bad in itself; debt the business cannot service in a bad year is. Net debt is debt minus cash, and below zero the company holds more cash than it owes.
Net debt ÷ EBITDA
—
Interest coverage
17× operating income ÷ interest
Current ratio
— current assets ÷ current liabilities
Cash conversion cycle
—
Three classic screens of the accounts
Each asks a different question of the same statements — is it improving, does it look like a company heading for distress, do the accounts resemble ones that were manipulated. None is a verdict; each shows what moves it.
Piotroski F-score
Is the business improving? Nine yes-or-no tests, this year against last.
2of 5 tests passed
✓ProfitableReturn on assets above zeropassed
✓Cash from operationsOperating cash flow above zeropassed
✕Profitability improvedReturn on assets higher than a year beforefailed
✕Profit backed by cashOperating cash flow above net income (low accruals)failed
–Less long-term debtLong-term debt as a share of assets fell — not reportedno data
–More liquidCurrent ratio higher than a year before — not reportedno data
–No new sharesShare count did not grow — not reportedno data
–Better gross marginGross margin higher than a year before — not reportedno data
✕Sells more per assetAsset turnover higher than a year beforefailed
Where it misleads: it measures change, not level. An excellent business that stood still for a year scores low; a poor one recovering from a disaster scores high.
Altman Z''-score
Does the balance sheet look like those of companies that went bankrupt?
The accounts lack a line it needs (retained earnings, current assets or liabilities).
Beneish M-score
Do the accounts resemble those of companies that manipulated their earnings?
The accounts lack too many of the lines it needs.
Where the statements disagree
Cross-checks between the income statement, the balance sheet and the cash flow for the latest year, each with the benign reading and the worrying one.
Reported profit comfortably exceeds the cash generated (66,968M against 45,969M).
Benign
Growth consuming working capital, or the seasonality of the year-end.
Worrying
Profit held up by accounting entries that do not turn into money.
What is it worth, under which assumptions?
A company is worth the cash it will generate, brought back to today. This model projects revenue with growth that fades over the years, applies a free cash flow margin, and discounts the result at the cost of capital. Every assumption says where it came from, and all of them can be changed.
The SEC accounts lack the lines needed for revenue, free cash flow or the share count, so there is no DCF for this company.
What it has filed lately
The last twelve months at the SEC, most important first: annual and quarterly reports, events, large holders and insiders.
Accounts from the company's own SEC filings; lines some companies do not report are shown as a dash rather than estimated. The risk-free rate is the 10-year US Treasury yield. A DCF is a way of making assumptions explicit, not a forecast: it states what the company would be worth if the assumptions held. The scores are screens that point where to look, not verdicts. Nothing here is a recommendation to buy or sell.