SAIA · Industrials · $11.3B mkt cap · FY2025 filings · Narrow moat ·
On the watchlist
2021–2025 (latest 5 aligned FYs; v3 window cap 5): revenue $2.3B to $3.2B, increasing; diluted EPS 9.48 to 9.52, increasing.
Not enough years of gross-margin data to score pricing power.
Median ROIC 13.7%, above the 12% hurdle in 80% of years.
Net debt/EBITDA 0.2x, interest coverage 21x.
Owner earnings changed +20.4%/yr over up to the ten most recent annual observations.
The pricingPower component abstained: Not enough years of gross-margin data to score pricing power. The other four 20% weights were renormalized over the scored 80%.
A cautious baseline, not a price target: what the shares may support if normalized owner earnings simply hold steady.
What today’s price assumes: owner earnings growing ~23%/yr over 5 years. The zero-growth 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 239% above the zero-growth estimate across 48 of the current top 50 companies by Moat Score with both values.
Score records captured Jul 26, 2026.
FTNT, META, MEDP, IBEX, MSFT, GOOGL, LULU, ANF, IDXX, TXRH, FHI, QLYS, FFIV, ADBE, LLY, MANH, VEEV, GRMN, SSD, MNST, DOCS, MCO, CPRT, NTAP, LRCX, NVDA, CORT, SFM, MPTI, ULTA, SN, RMD, ROL, PAYC, IRMD, INTU, DECK, MORN, LGCY, DAL, GWW, ISRG, MPWR, CTAS, LOPE, MRK, CMG, FAST, BKNG, ORLY
Missing a usable price or zero-growth estimate: ANF, BKNG.
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.
Across the filed record, revenue grew from $1.3B (FY2016) to $3.2B (FY2025) — about 11.1% a year compounded over 9 years.
It earned 9.8% on invested capital in the latest filed year, FY2025. Across the full 17-year measurable filed record, median ROIC was 12.5%. Over the v3 recent window (10 measurable filed years), median ROIC was 13.7%. The Returns on Capital filter above scores it 66/100.
The balance sheet carried $164M of total debt in FY2025 against $255M of owner earnings — roughly 0.6 years of owner earnings to retire it all. Balance-Sheet Safety scores it 97/100.
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.
Not disclosed in SAIA’s filings for these years — we don’t estimate it.
Gaps in a line mean that item isn’t in SAIA’s 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.
Flagship explainer
Saia, Inc.'s filing does not supply enough comparable lines for a truthful flow chart — here's what is filed:
| Filed line | Value | % of revenue | Source |
|---|---|---|---|
| $3.2B | 100% |
| |
| $352M | 11% |
| |
| Income before tax | $337M | 10% |
|
| Income tax | $82.4M | 3% |
|
| $255M | 8% |
|
Flagship explainer
Saia, Inc.'s filing tags don't support a full breakdown — here's what is filed:
| Filed line | Value | % of assets | Source |
|---|---|---|---|
| Total assets | $3.5B | 100% |
|
| Cash and equivalents | $19.7M | 1% |
|
| $164M | 5% |
| |
| Stockholders’ equity | $2.6B | 74% |
|
Flagship explainer
ROE is five filed business factors multiplied together.
| Input | Value | Fiscal year | Source |
|---|---|---|---|
| $255M | FY2025 |
| |
| Income before tax | $337M | FY2025 |
|
| Operating income | $352M | FY2025 |
|
| $3.2B | FY2025 |
| |
| Ending assets | $3.5B | FY2025 |
|
| Beginning assets | $3.2B | FY2024 |
|
| $2.6B | FY2025 |
| |
| $2.3B | FY2024 |
|
Flagship explainer
Saia, Inc.’s filing does not supply enough provenance-matched cash-flow lines for a truthful flow chart — here’s what is filed:
| Filed line | Value | % of cash from operations | Source |
|---|---|---|---|
| Cash from operations | $595M | 100% |
|
| Depreciation and amortization | $249M | 42% |
|
Curated 19-manager tier
Delayed public 13F reports for 2026-Q1—not live positions, trades, or recommendations.
0 holding0 exited19 not holding19/19 resolved
| Manager | Reported position | Quarter-over-quarter | Filing accession |
|---|---|---|---|
| Abrams Capital | No position reported | No position reported |
|
| Akre Capital | No position reported | No position reported |
|
| Baupost Group | No position reported | No position reported |
|
| Berkshire Hathaway | No position reported | No position reported |
|
| Brave Warrior Advisors | No position reported | No position reported |
|
| Dodge & Cox | No position reported | No position reported |
|
| First Eagle | No position reported | No position reported |
|
| Fundsmith | No position reported | No position reported |
|
| Gardner Russo & Quinn | No position reported | No position reported |
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| Gates Foundation Trust | No position reported | No position reported |
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| Mairs & Power | No position reported | No position reported |
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| Markel / Markel-Gayner | No position reported | No position reported |
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| Oakmark / Harris Associates | No position reported | No position reported |
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| Pershing Square | No position reported | No position reported |
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| Polen Capital | No position reported | No position reported |
|
| Sequoia / Ruane Cunniff | No position reported | No position reported |
|
| Southeastern Asset Management | No position reported | No position reported |
|
| Tweedy, Browne | No position reported | No position reported |
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| Yacktman Asset Management | No position reported | No position reported |
|
Position size uses shares and filed value from each manager’s 13F. Portfolio weight uses the eligible long-share filing denominator. Changes compare only with the immediately preceding calendar quarter.
Flagship explainer
Records still being gathered — partial as of retrieval Aug 11, 2026.
Partial coverage: the incomplete Form 4 walk cannot establish no activity, an activity date, or zero counts.
Breaks in the line mark methodology or normalizer upgrades — readings across versions aren’t compared, so a level shift there isn’t a change in the business.
Tier changesSame-methodology and same-normalizer crossings of the Wide / Narrow / Shallow bars
Scores are logged append-only and never overwritten — this record cannot be reconstructed retroactively, which is exactly why it’s worth keeping.
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.
This machine-readable surface covers SEC ownership filings from 2003; it does not represent earlier paper-era records.
Records still being gathered — partial as of retrieval Aug 11, 2026.
Trailing-12-month totals and the 90-day cluster result are withheld because this issuer walk is incomplete.
No reported Form 4 rows were captured for SAIA; the incomplete walk cannot establish zero activity, zero counts, or a negative cluster result.
A filing source-event date will appear when a Form 4 row is captured.
Retrieved .
How Saia, Inc.’s moat rated in each of the years we can reconstruct from its filings — scored only on what was knowable at the time — and what its price and returns did afterward. The score never saw a price; the two are joined only in hindsight, for education, not as a signal.
How to read this: each dot is what the engine would have scored SAIA on that December 31; the line below is its total-return price path (dividends reinvested) in the years since.
Two tracks, one timeline: the score has its own 0–100 scale (top), the price its own 100-based scale (bottom) — never a shared axis. The price path is a total-return (dividends reinvested) index built from the same data the forward returns use; gaps in the score line are years with no reconstructed rating (see the table for why). The Table view carries every value.
In the 4 years SAIA rated Wide-moat (2022, 2023, 2024 and 2025), the median forward total return that followed — measured only after each year’s filings were public — was:
These are medians computed from the data, not a claim about any one year. The company figures are total returns (dividends reinvested); the S&P 500 is the price-only ^GSPC index, which excludes dividends and so understates the index — the gap flatters the company. A quality rating is not a return forecast, and past returns don’t predict future ones. Educational only, not investment advice.
#33 of 428 scored Industrials companies, ranked by Moat Score.
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