Ascent Industries Co. — Earnings Quality Grade F
ACNT · Basic Materials
Major red flags
Screening Summary
Management Signals
Financial Trends
Revenue & Net Income ($B)
Margins (%)
18-Point Screening
Revenue Quality
DSO 49 days, change -6 days YoY
AR growth -17.9% vs revenue growth -7.2%
Revenue -7.2%, CFFO -103.5%. Cash follows revenue
Expense Quality
Inventory growth 52.6% far exceeds COGS -17.6%, margin rising. Fraud signal
Small-cap context: Inventory ratios on a small base are noisy; a single product launch can move them sharply.
CapEx growth 37.9% is >2x revenue growth -7.2%
SG&A/Gross Profit = 140.0%, exceeds 70%
Gross margin swung +9.7pp (13.2% → 23.0%)
Cash Flow Quality
CFFO < Net Income for 3 consecutive years
Small-cap context: Small-cap CFFO/NI often diverges from working-capital swings, not necessarily manipulation.
FCF is negative ($-0.0B)
Accruals ratio = 1.2%. Low accruals
Cash $0.1B covers debt $0.0B
Balance Sheet Health
No goodwill. Clean balance sheet
Debt/EBITDA = -5.0x. Healthy
Other assets -96.2% vs revenue -7.2%. Normal
Write-offs normal
Acquisition Risk
FCF after acquisitions positive
Goodwill+Intangibles change -100% YoY. Normal
Manipulation Score
M-Score = -3.11 (< -2.22). Unlikely manipulator
Portfolio monitoring
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Beneish M-Score
Altman Z-Score
Generated from public financial data using forensic accounting frameworks. Not investment advice. Data: Yahoo Finance · 2026-04-25