QualityDipStocks / Industrials · Garments and Clothing
Cintas CTAS
Not in a dip: trading near its 52-week high.
A quality company trading well above our fair value estimate, 6% over its Market Value.
- Fair value est.
- $108.62−51%
- Market Value
- $207.59price +6%
- Off 52-wk high
- −3%
- Risk vs market
- Lowbeta 0.09
5 bullish · 5 bearish See why
Key levels
Every level vs today’s $219.82
- Fair value est.base case$108.62−50.6%
- 52-wk lowlowest close, 1 year$163.55−25.6%
- Market Valueavg paid since Sep 23$207.59−5.6%
- PriceFri Oct 30 close$219.82you are here
- 52-wk highhighest close, 1 year$225.93+2.8%
Fair value estimate
How the range is computed
Ten-year free-cash-flow DCF. Same 10-year free-cash-flow model as the base: discount rate 9.5% ±1 point and growth 8.5% ±2 points. Bear = 10.5% and 6.5%; bull = 8.5% and 10.5% (both fade to 3%). A model estimate from public filings, not a forecast of where the price will go.
Price is above even the bull case.
What the price implies To be worth today’s price, CTAS’s free cash flow would need to grow about 21% a year for five years; our estimate uses 9%.
Risk vs market
How risk vs market is measured
One year of daily returns (Oct 30 to Oct 30, 252 sessions). Beta = how much CTAS moved for each 1% move in the S&P 500 (SPY); 1.0 moves with the market. Volatility is the yearly standard deviation of daily returns. Past behavior, not a forecast.
Has moved mostly independently of the market, but its own price swings are 1.8× the S&P 500’s (it moves on its own news).
- Beta vs S&P 500
- 0.09
- Volatility
- 24% vs 13% SPY
- Correlation SPY
- 0.05
- Correlation QQQ
- −0.16
Bull vs bear
Rule-based from the data on this page, strongest first. Not advice.
Top bullish points 5 of 5
ProfitabilityReturn on equity of 41% over the last 12 months.
ProfitabilityReturn on invested capital of 34%, above the 9.5% discount rate our DCF uses.
Balance sheetPaid down debt: $1.4B at FY2026, 29% less than at FY2024.
GrowthSales grew 10% to $11.6B over the last 12 months vs the 12 months before (SEC filings).
QualityPasses all four of our quality checks: cash generation, returns on capital, growth and balance sheet.
Top bearish points 5 of 5
ValuationOur DCF fair value estimate is $108.62, 51% below the price.
ValuationP/E of 43.3× vs a 27.5× median for the 130 Industrials companies we cover.
ValuationEV/EBITDA of 28.0×, above the 16.6× median for the 96 Industrials companies we cover.
ValuationFree-cash-flow yield of 2.3%, below the 3.5% median for the 144 Industrials companies we cover.
ValuationTrades 5.9% above its Market Value of $207.59, the average price paid since the Sep 23 filing.
Who’s talking about it
Notable investors, executives, analysts and public figures on Cintas in the last 48 hours. Headlines as published, each linked. Their words, not ours.
No notable mentions in the last 48 hours. Checked Nov 1, 9:09 PM ET.
Compare with peers
Closest in size in Industrials
All fundamentals
P/E 43.3 · FCF yield 2.3% · ROE 41%
Valuation
- P/E
- 43.3×3-yr-end avg 43.7× · Industrials median 27.5×
- Price / FCF
- 43.7×
- FCF yield
- 2.3%
- EV / EBITDA
- 28.0×
- Price / sales
- 7.69×
- Price / book
- 17.08×
- Market cap
- $88.9Bprice × diluted shares
- Enterprise value
- $90.1B
Growth
- Revenue, 12 months
- $11.6B
- Sales growth, 12 months
- +9.5%vs the 12 months before
- Sales growth, 3 yrs
- +8.5%/yrfrom FY2023
- Diluted EPS, 12 months
- $5.07
- EPS growth, last FY
- +11.6%
- Net income, 12 months
- $2.1B
- Net income growth
- +11%12 months vs before
Profitability
- Gross margin
- 51.0%
- Operating margin
- 23.4%
- Net margin
- 17.8%
- FCF margin
- 17.6%
- Return on equity
- 41%
- Return on invested capital
- 34%
Balance sheet
- Cash & short-term inv.
- $244M
- Total debt
- $1.4B
- Net cash
- −$1.2B
- Debt / equity
- 0.27×
- Interest coverage
- 25.3×operating income / interest
Cash flow & returns
- Free cash flow, 12 months
- $2.0B
- FCF growth, 12 months
- +19%
- Dividend yield
- 0.82%$724M paid
- Payout ratio
- 35%
- Buybacks, 12 months
- $1.0B1.1% of market cap
- Share count, 1 year
- −1.2%diluted shares vs a year ago
- Stock-based comp
- $129M
Trailing 12 months to Aug 31, 2026; balance sheet at Aug 31, 2026. From Cintas’s SEC filings. Sparklines show up to six fiscal years. n/a means we don’t hold that number, with the reason. How each is computed.
Valuation details
DCF $108.62 · MV $207.59 · FCF value $128.82
Assumes 8.5% growth for 5 years (revenue grew 8.5% a year FY23–FY26), fading to 3%; 9.5% discount rate, 3% terminal growth. FCF base $5.03 a share (trailing 12 months to Aug 31, 2026), from the 10-Q filed Oct 7, 2026. Net debt $1.2B, not deducted.
Setup & signals
No setup armed
No setup armed, so there’s no trigger or stop to track yet. Reversal signal rules only arm once a company is in a dip.
Momentum & 52-week range
RSI 62 · 5 days −1.9%
The business
FCF $2.0B · Sales +11%
- Free cash flow, 12 months$2.0B
- Free-cash-flow yield2.3%
- Free-cash-flow margin18%
- Gross margin51%
- Operating margin24%
- Return on invested capital28%
- Return on equity42%
- Sales growth (latest quarter vs year-ago quarter)+11%
- Net debt / EBITDA0.8×
Information only, not investment advice. Fair value estimates and talking points are rule-based model output from public data and can be wrong; stop levels are reference points, not orders. How every number is computed.
Get a text when CTAS fires a reversal signal
One text when a published rule fires on CTAS or any of the 333 quality companies we track: the ticker, the price, the stop and a link to the numbers. Nothing else.