MeritValue

JACOBS SOLUTIONS INC.

Jdata completeness 100%19 fiscal years on file
The thesis, from the filings

JACOBS SOLUTIONS INC. earns about 7% on invested capital, below its ~9% cost of capital, and has bought back 7% of its shares over 5 years — no moat visible in the numbers. The estimate methods put fair value between $54.74 and $181.23 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$14.1B1$9.78B2$10.9B3$11.5B3$12B3
Net income$477M4$644M5$665.8M6$806.1M6$289.3M6
Operating cash flow$726.3M7$474.7M8$974.8M9$1.05B9$686.7M9
Capital expenditure$92.8M10$127.6M11$137.5M12$121.1M12$79.2M12
Free cash flow (derived)$633.5M7$347.1M8$837.3M9$933.6M9$607.5M9
Total debt$2.89B13$3.41B14$2.87B15$2.22B16$2.24B16
Cash & equivalents$1.01B17$1.14B18$770.9M19$1.14B20$1.24B20
Diluted shares131.3M129.4M127.2M125.9M121.9M

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
$298.59
your share of equity
Profit it earned you last year
$23.73
Free cash flow it threw off
$49.82
Debt you’d be carrying
$183.42

10 shares is a claim on $298.59 of net worth that earned you $23.73 and generated $49.82 of cash last year, against $183.42 of debt.

iii. Is this a good business?
Moat signal · return on invested capital
7% avg · 5y
FY21 6%FY22 6%FY23 6%FY24 11%FY25 7%

It earned about 7% on invested capital against a ~9% cost of capital — below the cost of funding. The numbers show no moat.

seeing a moat in the numbers →
Management signal · capital allocation
−7% shares · 5y

Share count is down 7% over 5 years — management has been buying back stock, quietly handing owners a bigger slice. Total debt has fallen 23% — deleveraging.

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 $54.74 and $181.23 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
$181.23
assumptions (10)
  • riskFreeRate4.7%
  • equityRiskPremium5.0%
  • beta100.0%
  • equityWeight85.0%
  • costOfDebtSpread1.5%
  • taxRate21.0%
  • terminalGrowth2.5%
  • projectionYears10
  • fcfGrowth9.7%
  • fcfBase$837.3M
DCF · Growth Exit 5Y
$140.49
assumptions (10)
  • riskFreeRate4.7%
  • equityRiskPremium5.0%
  • beta100.0%
  • equityWeight85.0%
  • costOfDebtSpread1.5%
  • taxRate21.0%
  • terminalGrowth2.5%
  • projectionYears5
  • fcfGrowth9.7%
  • fcfBase$837.3M
Earnings Power Value
$54.74
assumptions (8)
  • riskFreeRate4.7%
  • equityRiskPremium5.0%
  • beta100.0%
  • equityWeight85.0%
  • costOfDebtSpread1.5%
  • taxRate21.0%
  • normalizedEarnings$644M
  • growthAssumed0.0%
Graham Number
$39.99
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 years9.7%
Discount rate (WACC)8.93%
Terminal growth2.5%
At your growth, a share is worth $140.49
The three cases
Bear0.0%$89.9
Base9.7%$140.49
Bull14.7%$173.96

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

Default growth 9.7%= 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 2021-10-01 · accession 0000052988-23-000084 (RevenueFromContractWithCustomerIncludingAssessedTax)
  2. 10-K · period ending 2022-09-30 · accession 0000052988-24-000065 (RevenueFromContractWithCustomerIncludingAssessedTax)
  3. 10-K · period ending 2023-09-29 · accession 0001628280-25-053316 (RevenueFromContractWithCustomerIncludingAssessedTax)
  4. 10-K · period ending 2021-10-01 · accession 0000052988-23-000084 (NetIncomeLoss)
  5. 10-K · period ending 2022-09-30 · accession 0000052988-24-000065 (NetIncomeLoss)
  6. 10-K · period ending 2023-09-29 · accession 0001628280-25-053316 (NetIncomeLoss)
  7. 10-K · period ending 2021-10-01 · accession 0000052988-23-000084 (NetCashProvidedByUsedInOperatingActivities)
  8. 10-K · period ending 2022-09-30 · accession 0000052988-24-000065 (NetCashProvidedByUsedInOperatingActivities)
  9. 10-K · period ending 2023-09-29 · accession 0001628280-25-053316 (NetCashProvidedByUsedInOperatingActivities)
  10. 10-K · period ending 2021-10-01 · accession 0000052988-23-000084 (PaymentsToAcquirePropertyPlantAndEquipment)
  11. 10-K · period ending 2022-09-30 · accession 0000052988-24-000065 (PaymentsToAcquirePropertyPlantAndEquipment)
  12. 10-K · period ending 2023-09-29 · accession 0001628280-25-053316 (PaymentsToAcquirePropertyPlantAndEquipment)
  13. 10-K · period ending 2021-10-01 · accession 0000052988-22-000111 (LongTermDebtNoncurrent)
  14. 10-K · period ending 2022-09-30 · accession 0000052988-23-000084 (LongTermDebtNoncurrent)
  15. 10-K · period ending 2023-09-29 · accession 0000052988-24-000065 (LongTermDebtNoncurrent)
  16. 10-K · period ending 2024-09-27 · accession 0001628280-25-053316 (LongTermDebtNoncurrent)
  17. 10-K · period ending 2021-10-01 · accession 0000052988-22-000111 (CashAndCashEquivalentsAtCarryingValue)
  18. 10-K · period ending 2022-09-30 · accession 0000052988-23-000084 (CashAndCashEquivalentsAtCarryingValue)
  19. 10-K · period ending 2023-09-29 · accession 0000052988-24-000065 (CashAndCashEquivalentsAtCarryingValue)
  20. 10-K · period ending 2024-09-27 · accession 0001628280-25-053316 (CashAndCashEquivalentsAtCarryingValue)