MeritValue

HERC HOLDINGS INC

HRIdata completeness 88%18 fiscal years on file
The thesis, from the filings

HERC HOLDINGS INC earns about 20% on invested capital, far above its ~9% cost of capital, but has diluted owners by 3% over 5 years — a real edge showing up in the numbers. The estimate methods put fair value between $73.92 and $843.85 a share.Whether it’s worth owning at today’s price is the last question — and yours to answer, below.

i. The business — what you’d actually own
FigureFY 2021FY 2022FY 2023FY 2024FY 2025
Revenue$273M1$358M2$600M3$592M3$862M3
Net income$224M4$330M5$347M6$211M6$1M6
Operating cash flow$743M7$917M8$1.09B9$1.23B9$1.09B9
Capital expenditure$47M10$104M11$156M12$161M12$157M12
Free cash flow (derived)$696M7$813M8$930M9$1.06B9$928M9
Total debt$11.4M13————
Cash & equivalents$35.1M14$54M15$71M16$83M17$52M17
Diluted shares30.4M30.2M28.7M28.5M31.4M

Superscripts are receipts. Each links to the SEC filing the number came from (full list at the bottom).

ii. Your slice — ownership made literal
If you owned
shares
Net assets behind them
$620.38
your share of equity
Profit it earned you last year
$0.32
Free cash flow it threw off
$295.54
Debt you’d be carrying
—

10 shares is a claim on $620.38 of net worth that earned you $0.32 and generated $295.54 of cash last year.

iii. Is this a good business?
Moat signal · return on invested capital
20% avg · 5y
FY21 30%FY22 40%FY23 14%FY24 16%FY25 0%

It earned about 20% on invested capital, year after year, against a ~9% cost of capital — the footprint of real pricing power. Competition usually drags returns like this back down; here it hasn't.

seeing a moat in the numbers →
Management signal · capital allocation
+3% shares · 5y

Share count is up 3% over 5 years — owners have been diluted. Worth asking what they got for it. Total debt has held roughly steady.

reading capital allocation →

Signals, not verdicts — read from the filings above. Numbers don’t prove a moat; they show its footprint. You decide.

iv. What it’s worth — engine v0.1.0

The 3 estimate methods that apply put fair value between $73.92 and $843.85 a share. They rest on different assumptions, so where they diverge is the story; the Graham Number is a stricter floor, not a target.

DCF · Growth Exit 10Y
$843.85
assumptions (10)
  • riskFreeRate4.7%
  • equityRiskPremium5.0%
  • beta100.0%
  • equityWeight85.0%
  • costOfDebtSpread1.5%
  • taxRate21.0%
  • terminalGrowth2.5%
  • projectionYears10
  • fcfGrowth10.1%
  • fcfBase$930M
DCF · Growth Exit 5Y
$653.65
assumptions (10)
  • riskFreeRate4.7%
  • equityRiskPremium5.0%
  • beta100.0%
  • equityWeight85.0%
  • costOfDebtSpread1.5%
  • taxRate21.0%
  • terminalGrowth2.5%
  • projectionYears5
  • fcfGrowth10.1%
  • fcfBase$930M
Earnings Power Value
$73.92
assumptions (8)
  • riskFreeRate4.7%
  • equityRiskPremium5.0%
  • beta100.0%
  • equityWeight85.0%
  • costOfDebtSpread1.5%
  • taxRate21.0%
  • normalizedEarnings$224M
  • growthAssumed0.0%
Graham Number
$6.47
assumptions (1)
  • grahamMultiplier2250.0%

Different models answer different questions — which to trust when →

v. The price question — last, on purpose
Is today’s price fair?
See live price ↗
Type a price. The ledger answers.
Or set your own belief
FCF growth, next 5 years10.1%
Discount rate (WACC)8.93%
Terminal growth2.5%
At your growth, a share is worth $653.65
The three cases
Bear0.0%$424.83
Base10.1%$653.65
Bull15.1%$799.98

Bear/base/bull growth = 0% / filed history / history + 5pp. Type a price to see the return each case implies.

Default growth 10.1%= this company’s own filed history (median-to-median FCF CAGR, clamped 0–20%). Your adjustments are recorded anonymously. They become the “what do owners actually believe” dataset.

Sources — the receipts
  1. 10-K · period ending 2021-12-31 · accession 0001364479-24-000006 (RevenueFromContractWithCustomerIncludingAssessedTax)
  2. 10-K · period ending 2022-12-31 · accession 0001364479-25-000007 (RevenueFromContractWithCustomerIncludingAssessedTax)
  3. 10-K · period ending 2023-12-31 · accession 0001364479-26-000050 (RevenueFromContractWithCustomerExcludingAssessedTax)
  4. 10-K · period ending 2021-12-31 · accession 0001364479-24-000006 (NetIncomeLoss)
  5. 10-K · period ending 2022-12-31 · accession 0001364479-25-000007 (NetIncomeLoss)
  6. 10-K · period ending 2023-12-31 · accession 0001364479-26-000050 (NetIncomeLoss)
  7. 10-K · period ending 2021-12-31 · accession 0001364479-24-000006 (NetCashProvidedByUsedInOperatingActivities)
  8. 10-K · period ending 2022-12-31 · accession 0001364479-25-000007 (NetCashProvidedByUsedInOperatingActivities)
  9. 10-K · period ending 2023-12-31 · accession 0001364479-26-000050 (NetCashProvidedByUsedInOperatingActivities)
  10. 10-K · period ending 2021-12-31 · accession 0001364479-24-000006 (PaymentsToAcquirePropertyPlantAndEquipment)
  11. 10-K · period ending 2022-12-31 · accession 0001364479-25-000007 (PaymentsToAcquirePropertyPlantAndEquipment)
  12. 10-K · period ending 2023-12-31 · accession 0001364479-26-000050 (PaymentsToAcquirePropertyPlantAndEquipment)
  13. 10-K · period ending 2021-12-31 · accession 0001364479-22-000007 (LongTermDebtCurrent)
  14. 10-K · period ending 2021-12-31 · accession 0001364479-23-000006 (CashAndCashEquivalentsAtCarryingValue)
  15. 10-K · period ending 2022-12-31 · accession 0001364479-24-000006 (CashAndCashEquivalentsAtCarryingValue)
  16. 10-K · period ending 2023-12-31 · accession 0001364479-25-000007 (CashAndCashEquivalentsAtCarryingValue)
  17. 10-K · period ending 2024-12-31 · accession 0001364479-26-000050 (CashAndCashEquivalentsAtCarryingValue)