MSA SAFETY INC
MNESP · Healthcare · $1.5B mkt cap · FY2025 filings · · Narrow moat ·
Wonderful & reasonably priced
The five investor questions
2021–2025 (latest 5 aligned FYs; v3 window cap 5): revenue $1.4B to $1.9B, increasing; diluted EPS 0.54 to 7.09, increasing.
Median gross margin 45.2% over 10y, very stable.
Median ROIC 13.2%, above the 12% hurdle in 70% of years.
Net debt/EBITDA 0.9x, interest coverage 12x.
Owner earnings changed +12.0%/yr over up to the ten most recent annual observations.
Price vs. value if growth stopped today
A cautious baseline, not a price target: what the shares may support if normalized owner earnings simply hold steady.
- $184M
- $52.59
- $85.20
- $37.50
- 29% below value if growth stopped today
A discount this large is often a warning rather than a bargain — the market may expect earnings to keep falling. See the revenue trend above.
How to read this
What today’s price assumes: owner earnings shrinking ~7%/yr over 5 years. The estimate assumes owner earnings stay flat (0% growth).
We solve for the constant annual change in owner earnings that would make the five-year zero-growth estimate equal today’s price. This keeps the existing model inputs and calculation unchanged; it is an expectations lens, not a forecast.
This zero-growth estimate assumes trailing owner earnings persist — unreliable for declining businesses. The recent FY revenue series does not trigger the three-consecutive-declines flag.
Among the current top-score group, the median current price is 238% above the zero-growth estimate across 49 of the current top 50 companies by Moat Score with both values.
Score records captured Sep 4, 2026.
Exactly which 50 companies?
FTNT, META, MEDP, IBEX, MSFT, GOOG, LULU, ANF, IDXX, TXRH, FHI, QLYS, FFIV, ADBE, LLY, MANH, VEEV, RMD, GRMN, PCTY, EAT, UI, SSD, MNST, DOCS, LRCX, MCO, CPRT, NTAP, NVDA, CORT, SFM, MPTI, ULTA, SN, ROL, CTAS, PAYC, IRMD, INTU, DECK, MORN, JKHY, TPR, LGCY, DAL, GWW, ISRG, MPWR, LOPE
Missing a usable price or zero-growth estimate: ANF.
Model details under moat-index@3.0.0: zero-growth multiple 11.1×, capped-growth comparison at no more than 18×; 9% discount rate; high-end growth 4% (capped at 4%) using min(5y revenue CAGR, 5y diluted-EPS CAGR), clamped to 0%–4%; maintenance capex uses min(capex, D&A); abstain when D&A is unavailable. This is a disclosed model range, not intrinsic value as fact.
19 years of fundamentals
The business, in plain English
MSA SAFETY INC booked $1.9B of revenue in FY2025 in the Healthcare sector and kept 46.5% of it as gross profit — a solid-margin business by that measure. After every other cost, 14.9% of each revenue dollar reached the bottom line.
Across the filed record, revenue grew from $1.1B (FY2008) to $1.9B (FY2025) — about 3.0% a year compounded over 17 years.
It earned 15.9% on invested capital in the latest filed year, FY2025. Across the full 12-year measurable filed record, median ROIC was 13.2%. Over the v3 recent window (10 measurable filed years), median ROIC was 13.2%. The Returns on Capital filter above scores it 60/100.
The balance sheet carried $581M of total debt in FY2025 against $282M of owner earnings — roughly 2.1 years of owner earnings to retire it all. Balance-Sheet Safety scores it 66/100.
Put together: Business Trend is the strongest of the five filters (90/100) and Returns on Capital the weakest (60/100), which is how MNESP lands at 74/100 — a Narrow moat.
This breakdown is generated from the filed numbers and sub-scores above — no outside narrative, no estimates. Where a filing doesn’t disclose an input, the sentence that would need it is omitted instead of guessed.
Exact FY and FY-1 financing invested-capital inputs are required.. Current-year EBIT, tax expense, and non-zero pretax income are required for standard ROIC.
The explained ROIC gaps have filed inputs but no meaningful positive invested-capital denominator. Other gaps mean the item is not in the filings for that year. The series is never interpolated or estimated. The Table view lists every filed value, including operating and net margins, total debt, and share count.
Visual explainers
The filing-backed explainer service is temporarily unavailable, so no partial or guessed chart is shown.
Moat Score history
Score history begins Sep 4, 2026 — the record builds forward from here.
Tier changesSame-methodology and same-normalizer crossings of the Wide / Narrow / Shallow bars
None yet — MNESP has read Narrow moat for every logged capture since Sep 4, 2026.
Scores are logged append-only and never overwritten — this record cannot be reconstructed retroactively, which is exactly why it’s worth keeping.
Insider activity
Form 4 reports mix P/S market or private transactions with compensation-plan mechanics. Activity casually described as “insider selling” can include compensation mechanics; awards, tax withholding, and option exercises are shown by their exact filed class here, never collapsed into “Bought” or “Sold.”
These are disclosed filing facts and arithmetic aggregates, not a signal or verdict.
The insider-filing service is temporarily unavailable, so no partial or guessed answer is shown for MNESP.
Healthcare context
#43 of 708 scored Healthcare companies, ranked by Moat Score.
Nearest peers by Moat Score
- #41ELTP Elite Pharmaceuticals, Inc.74.8 out of 100, Narrow moatNarrow moat
- #42WST WEST PHARMACEUTICAL SERVICES, INC.74.5 out of 100, Narrow moatNarrow moat
- #44VYCO VYCOR MEDICAL, INC.73.5 out of 100, Narrow moatNarrow moat
- #45SIGA Siga Technologies INC72.8 out of 100, Narrow moatNarrow moat
Compare MNESP with its nearest peers →All Healthcare companies on the Index →
Common questions about MNESP
- Does MSA SAFETY INC have an economic moat?
- Based on its FY2025 SEC filings, the Moat Index scores MSA SAFETY INC (MNESP) 73.5 out of 100 — a Narrow moat. The five questions behind that score begin at 20% each; if exactly one genuinely lacks data, the other four weights are renormalized and disclosed. revenue and EPS trend 90, pricing power 77, returns on capital 60, balance-sheet safety 66, capital allocation 74.
- Is MNESP trading below the conservative owner-earnings estimate?
- The value if growth stopped today — a zero-growth baseline — is $52.59 per share. It capitalizes normalized owner earnings at a 9% rate and assumes 0% growth. Versus a recent price of $37.50, that is 29% below value if growth stopped today. The model also publishes a capped-growth comparison, but the zero-growth estimate is the cautious baseline. It assumes trailing owner earnings persist and is unreliable for declining businesses. This is an educational estimate from primary SEC filings, not intrinsic value as a fact or investment advice.
- How has MNESP's Moat Score changed over time?
- The record logs 1 reading since Sep 4, 2026; the latest reads 73.5 out of 100 (narrow moat). No tier changes on record yet. The history is append-only — readings are only ever added, never rewritten.