Altman Z″
Needs current assets and current liabilities.
Concall notes and the half-year checks appear once the filing read is in.
A plain-language read of the business, how it actually earns, where the edge is, and the economics of every reported segment — taken from the annual report and investor presentation, not a one-line industry label.
Trading at 26.8x earnings against its own median of 27.7x: 0.1 standard deviations below its usual range. This compares the company with its own history, not with other companies.
How to read this: Price shows the closing price with its 50-day (amber) and 200-day (grey) averages; bars at the bottom are daily volume, green on up days and red on down days; dashed lines mark the 52-week high and low. vs Nifty 50 starts both at 100 so you can see which did better over the period. P/E shows what the market paid for each rupee of profit, inside the band it usually trades in. Drawdown shows how far below its best price the share has been. Hover anywhere for the numbers on that day.
The three to six things that actually matter about this company, each with the exact filing and note it came from — never a fact without the context that makes it meaningful.
What the numbers mean when read together — computed from the filings, not a score.
The business reported a profit, yet its operations drained cash rather than generating it. Profit that comes with negative operating cash is the single most important thing to understand here.
Why this reading: Flagged on a single year deliberately: negative operating cash alongside a reported profit is plain, material, and hard to explain benignly — exactly the kind of obvious signal that should never be smoothed over.
Operating cash flow ₹-1,364 cr against trailing net profit ₹2,137 cr. When operations consume cash while the P&L shows profit, ask whether receivables are ballooning, revenue is booked ahead of collection, or costs are being capitalised.
Over the last year profit declined 21.1% even as revenue grew 11.5% — margins are compressing, and any premium being paid rests on a year that moved backwards on the bottom line.
Why this reading: Flagged because the pattern is clear, material, and not explained by the visible numbers — the kind of thing worth understanding before anything else.
Trailing revenue ₹25,442 cr (up 11.5%) but trailing profit ₹1,908 cr (down 21.1%). Rising sales with falling profit points to cost inflation not passed through, mix shift to lower-margin lines, or one-off gains in the base year.
Free cash flow is negative — the business consumes more than it generates once capex is paid. Fine if it is deliberate growth investment; a problem if it is structural.
Why this reading: Noted with caution — worth watching, but not yet conclusive on its own. Business has ups and downs; one soft reading is not a verdict.
Latest free cash flow ₹-2,393 cr, negative in 4 of 12 years. Check whether the burn funds expansion (dark stores, plants, ports) or merely sustains operations.
Capital work-in-progress has stayed high (20% of fixed assets) without converting to productive assets — worth checking whether projects are genuinely progressing.
Why this reading: Noted with caution — worth watching, but not yet conclusive on its own. Business has ups and downs; one soft reading is not a verdict.
CWIP ₹2,227 cr vs ₹986 cr two years earlier, against fixed assets ₹11,256 cr. Perennial CWIP that never becomes a fixed asset can hide stalled projects or capitalised costs that should have been expensed.
Debt rose over 3 years, and most of it (1553%) has turned into fixed assets and projects under construction — the borrowing is building the business.
Why this reading: A positive signal: leverage taken on is visibly becoming productive capacity, not disappearing.
New borrowing ₹276 cr largely matched by an asset build of ₹4,287 cr. Debt that funds capacity is a different thing from debt that funds nothing.
Net margin improved from 3.3% to 7.5% year-on-year — the business is keeping more of each rupee.
Why this reading: A positive signal in the numbers, shown for balance alongside the concerns.
Quarter net margin 7.5% vs 3.3% four quarters earlier. Expansion from operating leverage is healthy; verify it is not a one-off gain.
Every score below is calculated here from the reported numbers — none of it is asserted. Open the notebook at the foot of the section to see each formula with this company's figures in it.
Needs current assets and current liabilities.
Piotroski F-Score — fundamental momentum — Joseph Piotroski, University of Chicago, 2000, in a study of whether accounting signals could improve returns among cheap stocks.
Nine yes-or-no tests across profitability, leverage and operating efficiency. Each pass scores one. It asks a narrow question: is this business getting better or worse on its own terms, year over year?
How to read it7 or more suggests improving fundamentals; 3 or fewer suggests deterioration. It measures direction, not quality — a weak company improving can score higher than a strong one holding steady.
Where it failsA single year of comparison, so one unusual year distorts it. Says nothing about valuation, competitive position or management. Piotroski designed it to rank already-cheap stocks, not to judge a company in isolation.
Needs trade receivables, current assets, other expenses.
Accruals are 13.2% of assets. Free cash flow negative in 4 of 12 years.
DuPont decomposition — Devised inside the DuPont Corporation in the 1920s and still the standard way to read a return on equity.
Splits return on equity into its three sources, so the same headline number can be traced to very different businesses.
How to read itA 20% ROE built on margin and turnover is a different proposition from a 20% ROE built on 3× leverage. The first survives a downturn; the second amplifies it.
Where it failsA single year. Negative equity makes it meaningless. Leverage is structural for lenders, so the third term carries no signal there.
cumulative operating cash flow ÷ cumulative net profit
₹17,522 cr ÷ ₹16,398 cr, over 11 years
1.07×
Above 1.0 means cash exceeds reported profit — the healthier reading.(net profit − operating cash flow) ÷ average total assets
(₹2,137 − ₹-1,364) cr ÷ average assets
13.2%
The share of profit that is accounting entries rather than cash. Above ~10% is where accruals start to dominate.net margin × asset turnover × leverage
8.2% × 0.94 × 1.34
10.4%
Splits ROE into whether returns come from operations or from borrowing.EBIT ÷ finance cost
₹2,269 cr ÷ ₹112 cr
20.26×
How many times operating profit covers the interest bill.borrowings ÷ net worth
₹429 cr ÷ ₹20,551 cr
0.02×
Read against the sector — infrastructure carries more than software.Needs more balance-sheet detail (only 3 of 6 flags testable).
NOPAT over equity plus debt less cash, at a notional 25% tax. Incremental ROIC is the return on money put in since then — the number that decides whether growth creates value or consumes it.
Return on invested capital, and incremental ROIC — Standard in corporate finance; the incremental form was popularised by Michael Mauboussin as the test of whether growth creates value.
ROIC measures what the business earns on all the capital it employs — equity plus debt, less cash. Incremental ROIC asks a sharper question: what has it earned on the money put in since a chosen year?
How to read itROIC comfortably above the cost of capital — call it 11–13% in India — means growth compounds. Below it, growth consumes. Incremental below headline means recent investment is earning less than the legacy business.
Where it failsDistorted in the year of a large acquisition. Understated for companies mid-build, where capital is deployed but capacity has not yet been commissioned — an incubator will look poor until it does not.
Read downward. Cash can cover EBITDA and still not survive capex — the third rung is where a capital-hungry business shows itself.
The earnings quality ladder — Not a named model — the standard sequence an analyst walks when testing whether reported profit is real.
Three ratios read in order, each stricter than the last.
How to read itRead downward. Each rung failing where the one above passed tells you exactly where the cash is going.
Where it failsA single year of heavy capex depresses the third rung legitimately. Judge it across a cycle.
Some figures appear twice on this page with different values. That is not an error — they sit on different bases. The live feed reports a rolling twelve months; everything computed here comes from the last audited statements. Both are shown so you can see which is which.
Where the two disagree, every model, screen and ratio computed on this page uses the filed figure, because the rest of the page is on that basis.
Models that need these lines are withheld rather than estimated: net worth, current assets, current liabilities, trade receivables, inventory, net block. Nothing on this page is back-solved from a figure the company did not publish.
Each framework below is a set of stated, mechanical criteria from published work, run against this company's own filed numbers. Passing or failing a screen is not a verdict — different frameworks disagree by design, and that disagreement is itself informative.
Benjamin Graham's stated criteria for a defensive stock, applied to the filed numbers. A company failing several is not disqualified — Graham designed these to be deliberately strict.
Two ratios only: what the business earns on its capital, and what you pay for those earnings. Designed to be ranked across a universe rather than read in isolation.
The fundamental half of William O'Neil's framework. The market and leadership components are judgement calls and are not scored here.
The characteristics long-term holders commonly look for: cash-backed earnings, high returns on capital, and debt that never forces a decision.
Median of the companies we hold in the same sector (Construction Materials). Every figure on both sides is the live feed's trailing twelve months, so the two are measured the same way whatever depth of extraction this company has had. A number only means something next to something else — expensive against the market and cheap against peers are different facts.
Bars are revenue; the line is net margin. Revenue rising while the line falls is the shape worth noticing.
Operating cash first, then what the business spent and raised.
One year is a snapshot. These are the two lines that matter across a cycle.
Rising debtor or inventory days against flat sales is the earliest visible sign of stress.
Set your own assumptions and watch the numbers move. A scenario calculator — the outputs are the arithmetic of your inputs.
One canonical set of figures — the same numbers used everywhere else on this page and on the screener.
How the register has moved over recent quarters — the direction matters more than the level.
Promoter held steady from 56.69% to 56.69% across these quarters.
FII trimmed from 5.99% to 5.75% across these quarters.
MF rose from 7.84% to 8.11% across these quarters.
Other held steady from 29.48% to 29.45% across these quarters.
Where cash gets stuck. A rising inventory or debtor line against flat sales is the earliest sign of trouble in the numbers.
| Measure | FY2018 | FY2019 | FY2020 | FY2021 | FY2023 | FY2024 | FY2025 | FY2026 |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Debtor days
How long customers take to pay | 21 | 15 | 12 | 10 | 14 | 15 | 20 | 54 |
| Inventory days
How long stock sits before it sells | 263 | 153 | 131 | 162 | 109 | 112 | 85 | 58 |
| Payable days
How long the company takes to pay suppliers | 301 | 198 | 207 | 243 | 110 | 111 | 73 | 80 |
| Cash conversion cycle
Debtor + inventory − payable days | -17 | -30 | -64 | -70 | 13 | 16 | 32 | 32 |
| Working capital days | -28 | -42 | -63 | -71 | 36 | 18 | 6 | 71 |
| ROCE %
Return on capital employed | 16.0% | 19.0% | 16.0% | 19.0% | 9.0% | 17.0% | 17.0% | 11.0% |
What this sector is read on: Order inflow, Order book, Book to bill, Execution rate, Unbilled revenue, Customer advances, Government share of book, Working capital days. These come from the filings, not the market feed, and appear here once a quarter is read.
Read using the Capital goods and EPC framework (from the listed sector). Primary valuation lens: P/E against order book quality.
Read more closely in this sector: Unbilled revenue growing faster than billed receivables · Order inflow against execution · Bank guarantees outstanding growing faster than the order book · Liquidated damages or cost overruns disclosed.
The shape of the business over time (annual) — read the direction, not the single print.
| Line | FY2019 | FY2020 | FY2021 | FY2024 | FY2025 | FY2026 |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Revenue from operations | 15,658 | 13,786 | 16,152 | 19,959 | 21,762 | 25,962 |
| Other income | 332 | 50 | 164 | 735 | 1,175 | 429 |
| Depreciation | 606 | 639 | 601 | 885 | 1,001 | 1,118 |
| Finance cost | 86 | 57 | 55 | 155 | 108 | 112 |
| Profit before tax | 2,053 | 1,709 | 2,506 | 2,757 | 3,127 | 2,157 |
| Net profit (owners) | 1,378 | 1,430 | 1,863 | 2,335 | 2,402 | 2,137 |
| EPS (₹) | 73.35 | 76.16 | 99.21 | 124.34 | 127.92 | 113.80 |
Exceptional items, total income and EBITDA are read from the filed statements.
| Metric | Dec 2023 | Mar 2024 | Jun 2024 | Sep 2024 | Dec 2024 | Mar 2025 | Jun 2025 | Sep 2025 | Dec 2025 | Mar 2026 | Jun 2026 | Mar 2023 15m |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Revenue | 4,914 | 5,409 | 5,199 | 4,634 | 5,972 | 6,115 | 6,087 | 6,005 | 6,483 | 7,146 | 5,808 | 22,210 |
| Other Income | 94 | 350 | 73 | 124 | 649 | 330 | 70 | 225 | 91 | 50 | 31 | 196 |
| Expenses | 4,010 | 4,572 | 4,520 | 4,198 | 4,856 | 5,284 | 5,309 | 5,159 | 5,783 | 6,520 | 5,351 | 20,285 |
| Depreciation | 235 | 237 | 235 | 242 | 260 | 265 | 255 | 279 | 306 | 279 | 261 | 841 |
| Finance cost | 34 | 67 | 33 | 33 | 28 | 14 | 30 | 29 | 26 | 27 | 27 | 77 |
| Profit before tax | 729 | 883 | 484 | 284 | 1,476 | 882 | 563 | 763 | 460 | 370 | 200 | 1,203 |
| Net Profit | 538 | 943 | 360 | 200 | 1,092 | 751 | 375 | 1,119 | 404 | 238 | 147 | 885 |
| EPS | 28.63 | 50.23 | 19.15 | 10.63 | 58.14 | 39.99 | 19.99 | 59.60 | 21.52 | 12.69 | 7.83 | 47.13 |
| Item | FY2020 | FY2021 | FY2023 | FY2024 | FY2025 | FY2026 |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Equity Capital | 188 | 188 | 188 | 188 | 188 | 188 |
| Reserves | 12,511 | 14,121 | 13,950 | 16,140 | 18,367 | 20,363 |
| Borrowings | 102 | 126 | 153 | 355 | 430 | 429 |
| Net block | 6,694 | 6,750 | 7,512 | 10,007 | 10,829 | 11,256 |
| CWIP | 548 | 1,216 | 1,684 | 986 | 2,061 | 2,227 |
| Investments | 129 | 150 | 163 | 811 | 1,509 | 55 |
| Total Assets | 18,200 | 21,039 | 20,544 | 23,368 | 25,413 | 27,525 |
| Line | FY2020 | FY2021 | FY2023 | FY2024 | FY2025 | FY2026 |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Cash from operations | 2,219 | 2,835 | -1,235 | 2,995 | 1,711 | -1,364 |
| Cash from investing | -535 | -988 | -4,637 | -1,205 | -1,262 | 1,273 |
| Cash from financing | -327 | -331 | -1,238 | -443 | -1,002 | -422 |
| Free cash flow | 1,471 | 1,682 | -3,216 | 1,646 | -242 | -2,393 |
| Net change in cash | 1,357 | 1,517 | -7,110 | 1,347 | -553 | -513 |
Cash from operations is the number profit has to answer to. Free cash flow is what remains after the business pays for its own growth.
The part no one reads: the auditor's opinion, the contingent liabilities buried in the notes, the covenants, and the claims in the deck placed beside the figures that test them.
Where analysts pressed management on the earnings call, and exactly how management answered — the questions that were hardest to answer are usually the ones that matter.
These are coverage counts, not ratings. Each one asks a fixed set of questions of the filings and reports how many the company answered. A company that discloses nothing counts nothing here — that is a statement about the disclosure, not about the business.
The same read, applied to the companies this one competes with.
ACC Ltd. reported revenue of ₹5,689 cr for July to September 2026, −5.3% on the year and −2.0% on the quarter. That is slower than this quarter has grown in recent years (+17.0% on average). Over the last four quarters revenue comes to ₹25,126 cr, +3.9% on the four before.
Operating profit (EBITDA) was ₹401 cr, a margin of 7.0%, −704 bps on the year and −82 bps on the quarter. It is the narrowest margin of the last 8 quarters (range 7.0% to 18.7%). Operating costs grew +2.5%, faster than revenue at −5.3%, so operating profit grew less than sales.
Net profit was ₹93.0 cr, −91.7% on the year and −36.7% on the quarter, with earnings per share of ₹4.95. Profit before other income, one-offs and tax grew faster, at −83.8%; other income, one-offs or tax held the headline back. The tax rate of 25% is in line with its recent average. Profit over the last four quarters totals ₹882 cr, −73.6% on the four before.
Of the 30 companies in Capital goods and EPC that have reported Q2 FY27 so far, ACC Ltd. ranks 28th on revenue growth; the sector median is +21.3%. Its margin moved −704 bps on the year against a sector median of +13 bps.
Capital goods and EPC revenue follows project execution, which makes quarters uneven; the order book and new orders tell more about the year than one quarter does. The quarterly statements do not carry the order book, new orders and working capital; those come with the filing read.
On earnings per share of ₹46.99 over the last four quarters, the stock at ₹1,192.50 trades at 25.4 times trailing earnings.
Written from the quarterly statements. The filing read adds the balance sheet and cash flow filed with this quarter, the auditor's review, segment results, one-off items line by line and what management said on the call.
Operating margin fell sharply on the year. Pricing, input costs, or mix?
Source: Quarterly statements
Could not run on this quarter: Exceptional items that recur, Cash behind the profit, Receivables against sales, Inventory against sales, Borrowing while holding cash, Auditor's review or audit report, IPO money used as stated, Related-party transactions, Exits, postponements, restatements, Promoter pledges and allotments, Earlier promises against delivery. Most need the filing read (balance sheet, cash flow, auditor, disclosures).
Net profit a year ago, each driver's change, and net profit now. Blue added profit, red took it away.
This quarter's filing carries a balance sheet and a cash flow statement. The cash, receivables and borrowing checks run once the filing read is in.
| Q3 FY24 | Q4 FY24 | Q1 FY25 | Q2 FY25 | Q3 FY25 | Q4 FY25 | Q1 FY26 | Q2 FY26 | Q3 FY26 | Q4 FY26 | Q1 FY27 | Q2 FY27 | |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Revenue | ₹4,914 cr | ₹5,409 cr | ₹5,199 cr | ₹4,634 cr | ₹5,972 cr | ₹6,115 cr | ₹6,087 cr | ₹6,005 cr | ₹6,483 cr | ₹7,146 cr | ₹5,808 cr | ₹5,689 cr |
| YoY | — | — | −0% | +4% | +22% | +13% | +17% | +30% | +9% | +17% | −5% | −5% |
| EBITDA margin | 18.4% | 15.5% | 13.1% | 9.4% | 18.7% | 13.6% | 12.8% | 14.1% | 10.8% | 8.8% | 7.9% | 7.0% |
| Other income, % of PBT | 13% | 40% | 15% | 44% | 44% | 37% | 12% | 29% | 20% | 14% | 16% | 30% |
| Exceptional items | — | — | — | — | — | — | — | — | — | — | — | — |
| Tax rate | 26% | −7% | 26% | 30% | 26% | 15% | 33% | −47% | 12% | 36% | 26% | 25% |
| Net profit | ₹538 cr | ₹943 cr | ₹360 cr | ₹200 cr | ₹1,092 cr | ₹751 cr | ₹375 cr | ₹1,119 cr | ₹404 cr | ₹238 cr | ₹147 cr | ₹93.0 cr |
| YoY | — | — | −23% | −48% | +103% | −20% | +4% | +460% | −63% | −68% | −61% | −92% |
| Core profit YoY | — | — | −25% | −48% | +30% | +4% | +20% | +236% | −55% | −42% | −66% | −84% |
| EPS | ₹28.63 | ₹50.23 | ₹19.15 | ₹10.63 | ₹58.14 | ₹39.99 | ₹19.99 | ₹59.59 | ₹21.52 | ₹12.69 | ₹7.83 | ₹4.95 |
| Flags | · | 2 | ✓ | ✓ | 2 | 1 | ✓ | 2 | 2 | 1 | 1 | 1 |
Each quarter is read with the same rules. Balance-sheet and cash checks run on half-year and annual quarters; filing-read checks run where a read exists.