Pearson plc

Price story Before the numbers, the tape. A stock price moves through four repeating seasons: a flat base (stage 1), an advance (2), a top (3), a decline (4). Where the price sits in that cycle frames everything below.

Pearson plc trades at $16.6, losing momentum at the top and 17 weeks into that stage. That is +16.5% against its own 200-day average. It sits at 92% of a 52-week range of $12 to $17. On relative strength it has been ahead of the S&P 500 on a trailing-13-week view for 17 straight weeks.

Today the stock is losing momentum at the top — week 17 of stage 3. At $16.6 it trades +16.5% versus its 200-day average and sits at 92% of its 52-week range ($12–$17).

Against the market, two honest reads. Cumulative: over the last 10.1 years the stock moved +35% while the S&P 500 moved +263% — behind the index over the full window. Recent form: on a trailing-13-week view the stock has been ahead for 17 straight weeks — the ribbon below is that same metric, week by week.

What would end the trend, mechanically: two Friday closes in a row below the 200-day line. That is the exit rule — no debates.

Valuation P/E is the price of $1 of annual profit: how many dollars the market pays for each dollar the company earns in a year.

Pearson plc trades at 23.4× P/E, against too little history to rank. This places the multiple against the stock’s own record, and says nothing about what the business is worth.

Today's P/E of 23.4× is against too little history to rank. This is a comparison against the stock's own history — not a claim about what it is worth.

🚨 Why the multiple sits where it does: over the past year annual EPS moved −20.2% against a +10.6% price move — the price outran earnings, pushing the multiple UP its own range.

The price move, decomposed: over 5y, of the +8.2%/yr price move, ~+9.1%/yr came from earnings growth and ~−0.9 pp from the multiple (roughly flat). The split is the honest approximate (price return minus earnings growth); it makes the rally itself visible instead of hiding it behind the percentile.

Put together: the multiple is unremarkable against its own past, so the story rests on the earnings line underneath it, not the multiple.

Stage: Mixed Every business sits somewhere on a fundamental arc, and this page names the spot before anything else. The last twelve quarters of revenue, profit and EPS growth — plus the return the business earns on its capital — are read as curves: Deteriorating (the curves are falling), Turning around (a trough has just formed and the last few quarters lift off it), Improving (the climb off the trough is sustained), Consistent (steadily positive with healthy returns), Topping out (still high but decelerating from the peak). When the curves genuinely disagree the read is Mixed; too little history is No read. CAGR (compound annual growth rate) is the smooth yearly pace that turns the starting value into the latest one — the fairest way to compare growth across different time spans. Read the columns together: if the 1-year number towers over the 10-year, recent growth is running hotter than the long-run trend. A dash means that window is not held, or the base year was a loss (where a growth rate is not meaningful).

Pearson plc reads as mixed on its fundamental arc. Mixed — no clean majority across the growth curves, ROCE lifting at 19.8% — the per-curve reads carry the story. The read is built from 12 quarters across 4 curves, on full evidence.

Why it matters: when the curves disagree, the per-curve reads above matter more than any single verdict.

4-Factor Sector Score

46.8/100 — rank 6 of 6 in Publishing · 43% evidence confidence · provisional, ranked below fully-evidenced peers

Pearson plc scores 46.8 out of 100 against the 6 companies it is compared with in Publishing, ranking 6. Fill the missing evidence before acting; the ranking is deliberately pulled toward neutral.

The four contributions add to the total exactly: 17.3 + 9.9 + 9.7 + 9.9 = 46.8. This is the SAME number shown on the sector comparison — it is computed once, for the whole peer set, and read here.

What would change it: The read weakens if profit growth turns negative or margin improvement reverses while sector-relative strength deteriorates.

Revenue Revenue is the top line: everything the company billed its customers in the period.

Pearson plc reported $1.9 B of revenue in the Dec 25 quarter, +2.8% year on year. Over 4 years it has compounded at 1.1% a year. The last full year, FY25, came in at $3.6 B. The last four reported quarters add to $7.1 B.

FY25 revenue came in at $3.6 B (+0.8% on the year), capping 4 years at 1.1% compound. The latest quarter (Dec 25) printed $1.9 B, +2.8% year on year.

Pace check: the last four quarters averaged −1.3% growth against the decade's 1.1% — the current year is running slower than its own long-run rate.

Acceleration check: trailing-twelve-month revenue grew −5.2% over the last 4 quarters against +2.1%/yr over the last 8 — rolling over; TTM profit +23.8% vs +28.8%/yr — rolling over.

Operating margin Operating margin is what is left of every $100 of sales after running the business, before interest and tax. It is the cleanest read on pricing power and cost control.

Pearson plc's operating margin is 14.6% in the Dec 25 quarter, −3.2 percentage points against the same quarter a year ago. Across the last four quarters the operating margin has moved −1.0 percentage points. Across 5 fiscal years the operating margin has ranged 5.2% to 15.2%. The current quarter sits inside that band.

The latest quarter's operating margin is 14.6%, −3.2 pp against the same quarter a year ago. Across 5 fiscal years the operating margin has ranged 5.2%–15.2%.

🚨 Why the margin moved: operating margin went −1.0 pp year on year while gross margin went +1.6 pp — the loss came mostly from the gross line: input costs and pricing.

Net profit Net profit is what survives every cost, interest and tax — the number EPS, dividends and book value all grow from.

Pearson plc earned $0.2 B of net profit in the Dec 25 quarter, −39.3% year on year. Full-year FY25 profit was $0.3 B. The 4-year compound rate is 17.2%. That is 9.2% of the quarter's revenue. The same quarter a year earlier earned $0.2 B.

Dec 25 profit was $0.2 B, −39.3% year on year. On the full year, FY25 printed $0.3 B (−20.9%), and the 4-year compound rate is 17.2%.

🚨 Why profit moved: revenue contributed +2.8% and the margin −3.2 pp — the quarter was revenue-led despite a thinner margin.

Pace comparison, last four quarters: profit −0.3% vs revenue −1.3%. Profit and revenue are moving roughly in step.

Cash flow — the router The P&L says what was earned; the cash-flow statement says what actually arrived. Operating cash flow (CFO) against profit is the cleanest lie detector in the accounts.

Over the last 3 fiscal years 158% of Pearson plc's reported profit arrived as operating cash — the cash follows the profit. In FY25 that was $0.7 B of operating cash against $0.3 B of profit. After $0.0 B of capital spending, $0.6 B was left as free cash.

FY25: operating cash of $0.7 B against reported profit of $0.3 B, leaving free cash of $0.6 B after $0.0 B of capital spending. Across the last 3 fiscal years the conversion rate is 158% of profit.

Cash-flow readings here are annual — that is the resolution our series carries, so this section moves once a year.

Why: conversion is measured cleanly, but the working-capital day-counts behind it sit below what we hold — the move is shown without inventing its driver.

Router verdict: the visible cash user is investment — the next section checks what the spending is buying.

Where the cash goes Working capital is the cash tied up between paying suppliers and getting paid: debtor days (customers owe), inventory days (stock waits), and the cash conversion cycle (the whole loop, in days of sales).

Pearson plc does not report the debtor, inventory and payable day-counts a cash cycle is built from, so this section reads the investment side instead. Capital spending ran $0.0 B over the last 3 years. Averaged over those years that is 0.0% of FY25 revenue a year.

Working-capital day-counts are not in our numbers for this stock, so this section reads the investment side — where the cash is being put to work.

On the investment side: capital spending of $0.0 B over the last 3 fiscal years.

The synthesis: the cash is going into capacity, not disappearing into the cycle — the question becomes whether the new capacity earns.

Return on equity Return on equity (ROE) is the profit the business earns on its shareholders’ money. With the full capital-employed split not in our numbers, ROE is the cleanest long ladder we can draw here.

Pearson plc earns a ROE of 9% in FY25. That is up from a trough of 4% in FY21. Return on invested capital clears the cost of that capital by +3.8 percentage points, so growth here adds value rather than only size. The wiring behind it is 9.5% net margin on 0.55× asset turns.

FY25 ROE is 9%, recovered from a FY21 trough of 4% — the full ladder below shows the fall and the climb, undoctored.

Why the return is what it is — the wiring (FY25): 9.5% net margin × 0.55× asset turns × 1.77× balance-sheet leverage ≈ 9.2% on equity. Margin does its share; leverage is a meaningful part of the equation.

The capstone test — ROIC − WACC: 7.7% − 3.9% = a +3.8 pp spread. The 3.9% is an estimate of this company's own cost of capital — read the sign and the size of the spread, not the decimals. Positive but thin — value creation with little room for error.

Dividend

Pearson plc pays no dividend. Across the last 12 reported quarters it has declared no dividend per share, so there is no payout history to chart and no yield to quote. Companies at this stage typically reinvest earnings rather than distribute them, which makes the cash-flow and reinvestment sections the place that cash shows up.

Pearson plc does not currently pay a dividend. Across the last 12 reported quarters the company has declared no dividend per share, so there is no payout history to chart and no yield to quote. Companies at this stage typically reinvest earnings instead of distributing them.

Debt Debt-to-equity says how much of the business is funded by borrowings; interest cover says how many times operating profit pays the interest bill. Low and high, respectively, is the safe corner.

Debt-to-equity is 0.52 at the latest reading — modestly levered; a full borrowings history is not in our numbers.

We hold only the latest reading here: a debt-to-equity of 0.52 — a modest level of leverage behind the returns above. A year-by-year borrowings ladder is not in our numbers for this stock, so we say that rather than draw a chart we cannot support.

Ownership There is no quarter-by-quarter holder register to read here, so we read the crowd through short interest — the slice of tradable shares currently sold short, positioned for a fall.

No ownership or positioning reading is held for Pearson plc, so this section names the gap rather than filling it. At typical trading volumes those positions would take about 3.7 days to buy back. There is no quarter-by-quarter holder register to read for this filer, so the crowd is read through short interest instead.

We hold no ownership or positioning reading for this stock, so this section says that plainly.

Safety line The Z-score estimates how far a company sits from balance-sheet distress — above roughly 3 is safe, below roughly 1.8 is the danger zone. It was built for manufacturers, so it is not applied to banks and lenders.

Pearson plc: the Z-score reads 2.42. A Z-score above roughly 3 reads as safe and below roughly 1.8 as the distress zone, so this sits in the grey band between the two. It is a distance-to-distress estimate from the balance sheet, not a forecast of failure.

Why it matters: a Z-score of 2.42 sits in the grey band — neither clearly safe nor clearly distressed.

The safety line in one sentence: the Z-score reads 2.42.

Frequently asked questions