One-glance verdict
Overvalued
$27.53 our estimate vs market $49.44
Wall Street consensus: $48.53 (76.3% higher than our fair-value estimate)
80% above our estimate, beyond the bull case
Fundamentals snapshot
Fastenal Company
FAST · NMS · Industrials · Industrial Distribution
Current price
$49.44
52-week range
$38.97 - $52.92
Market cap
$56.73B
Balance sheet
Healthy
267.05x Strong cushion
Net debt $236.80M. Interest coverage shows how many times profit covers the interest bill.
What stands out
3 Rewards
2 Risks
3 rewards · 2 risks
- Reward Revenue grew 6.7% last year.
- Reward Returns 34.3% on equity, ahead of 66% of its peers.
- Risk Stock trades 30.1% above its 5-year average P/E.
- Risk Insider ownership is only 0.1% (peer median: 1.8%).
What this company does
Fastenal Company
Fastenal is like a giant hardware store for businesses, selling nuts, bolts, screws, and other industrial supplies to factories and construction companies. The company makes money by being a crucial part of its customers' supply chain (the system for getting necessary parts and materials), often by placing vending machines with its products directly on-site for easy access. This makes it convenient for workers to get the small but essential parts they need, helping other businesses run their operations smoothly without costly delays.
How the company got here
Fastenal began in 1967 in Winona, Minnesota, when Bob Kierlin and four friends pooled $30,000 to open a 1,000-square-foot store selling nuts and bolts. The initial idea was to sell fasteners through vending machines, but the technology wasn't ready yet. The company found its footing by focusing on excellent customer service and ensuring parts were readily available, which was often more important to customers than the lowest price. After going public in 1987, Fastenal expanded rapidly across the U.S. and internationally, growing from a single shop into a global distributor of industrial and construction supplies.
What it actually does
Fastenal is a giant hardware store for businesses, but instead of selling to individuals doing home projects, it sells to other companies. It provides a huge range of industrial and construction supplies, from the simple nuts and bolts it started with to safety equipment, tools, and much more. Think of all the materials a factory, a construction site, or a maintenance crew might need – Fastenal acts as the supplier for those items. A key part of its business is not just selling products, but also managing the inventory (the stock of supplies) for its customers, often right at their own facilities.
Fasteners
This is the company's original and core business, making it the largest distributor of fasteners in North America. This segment includes all types of threaded fasteners like bolts, nuts, screws, and washers that are essential for holding things together in manufactured products and construction projects. Customers range from large original equipment manufacturers (companies that make finished products from parts) to construction crews and maintenance departments. While it's a huge part of the business, the company has been actively expanding its other product lines to become a more complete supplier for its customers.
Safety Supplies and Other Products
Beyond fasteners, Fastenal sells a vast array of other items that businesses need to operate safely and efficiently. This includes personal protective equipment (PPE) like gloves and safety glasses, cleaning supplies, cutting tools, and general maintenance, repair, and operations (MRO) products. This category has become a major part of the business as Fastenal aims to be a one-stop shop for its customers. By providing these essential but diverse supplies, the company deepens its relationship with customers who can get more of what they need from a single, reliable source.
Onsite & Vending (FAST Solutions)
This is a fast-growing and very important part of Fastenal's business that focuses on service rather than just products. Through its "Onsite" program, Fastenal sets up and manages a small, dedicated supply shop right inside a customer's factory or facility, staffed by Fastenal employees. It also deploys thousands of industrial vending machines and smart bins ("FAST Bins") that automatically track and reorder supplies as they are used. For the customer, this means they never run out of critical parts and can reduce the time their own employees spend managing supplies; for Fastenal, it creates a very close and long-term partnership.
What management is betting on now
Management's strategy is heavily focused on getting closer to its customers through technology and on-site services. They are aggressively expanding the number of "Onsite" locations, believing that managing a customer's supply chain (the entire process of getting and storing supplies) from inside their own building is the best way to create value and lock in business. The company is also investing heavily in its digital footprint, which includes industrial vending machines and e-commerce platforms, to make ordering and inventory management seamless for clients. The goal is to become so integrated into a customer's daily operations that Fastenal becomes an indispensable partner, not just a supplier.
Price history
How the share price has moved
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Earnings history
Last 8 quarters — what happened
Click any quarter to read the call summary and what the numbers say.
FY2024 Q3
$237.50M
FY2024 Q4
$222.60M
FY2025 Q1
$206.50M
FY2025 Q2
$209.30M
FY2025 Q3
$326.60M
FY2025 Q4
$308.20M
FY2026 Q1
$319.50M
FY2026 Q2
$201.60M
Revenue
$2.39B
Net income
$382.80M
Diluted EPS
0.33
Operating cash flow
$265.70M
Free cash flow
$201.60M
Fetching…
Sources
Revenue
$2.20B
Net income
$339.80M
Diluted EPS
0.30
Operating cash flow
$378.40M
Free cash flow
$319.50M
Fetching…
Sources
Revenue
$2.03B
Net income
$293.90M
Diluted EPS
-0.01
Operating cash flow
$368.20M
Free cash flow
$308.20M
Fetching…
Sources
Revenue
$2.13B
Net income
$335.50M
Diluted EPS
0.29
Operating cash flow
$386.90M
Free cash flow
$326.60M
Fetching…
Sources
Revenue
$2.08B
Net income
$330.30M
Diluted EPS
0.29
Operating cash flow
$278.60M
Free cash flow
$209.30M
Fetching…
Sources
Revenue
$1.96B
Net income
$298.70M
Diluted EPS
0.52
Operating cash flow
$262.20M
Free cash flow
$206.50M
Fetching…
Sources
Revenue
$1.82B
Net income
$262.10M
Diluted EPS
0.45
Operating cash flow
$282.80M
Free cash flow
$222.60M
Fetching…
Sources
Revenue
$1.91B
Net income
$298.10M
Diluted EPS
0.52
Operating cash flow
$296.90M
Free cash flow
$237.50M
Fetching…
Sources
Is it cheap or expensive?
Fair value $27.53 vs current price $49.44
Wall Street consensus is the average analyst price target: $48.53 (76.3% higher than our fair-value estimate).
Our most-likely fair value is $27.53 a share — about 44.3% below today's price of $49.44, so the stock currently looks expensive (overvalued).
Is it drowning in debt?
Healthy
Net debt $236.8M. Interest coverage 267.0x.
Net debt
$236.80M
Interest coverage
267.05x
Fastenal Company's profit covers its interest bill about 267.0 times over. which is stronger than every peer shown here.
Healthy
Worse cushion
Baseline
Better cushion
FAST
BASELINE
Fastenal Company
Total debt $441.50M Interest coverage 267.05x This is the baseline the peer rows are being compared against.
Total debt $2.80B Interest coverage 30.80x -88% vs FAST Carries about 8.7x less debt cushion than FAST.
Total debt $555.42M Interest coverage 12.99x -95% vs FAST Carries about 20.6x less debt cushion than FAST.
Total debt $483.44M Interest coverage 31.60x -88% vs FAST Carries about 8.4x less debt cushion than FAST.
Total debt $6.71B Interest coverage 3.19x -99% vs FAST Carries about 83.8x less debt cushion than FAST.
Total debt $6.65B Interest coverage 7.43x -97% vs FAST Carries about 35.9x less debt cushion than FAST.
What you should know
The case for and against FAST
3 Rewards
2 Risks
Rewards
-
Revenue grew 6.7% last year.
-
Returns 34.3% on equity, ahead of 66% of its peers.
-
Free cash flow was positive in 10/10 years.
Risks
-
Stock trades 30.1% above its 5-year average P/E.
-
Insider ownership is only 0.1% (peer median: 1.8%).
The numbers
All the key metrics, grouped by purpose
Tap any ? icon to learn what it means.
Valuation
How expensive the stock looks
P/E (TTM)
42.26x
Forward P/E
35.29x
P/B
13.94x
P/S
6.48x
EV/EBITDA
29.14x
PEG ratio
3.28x
Profitability
How much profit each dollar creates
Gross margin
44.7%
Operating margin
21.0%
Net margin
15.5%
ROE
34.3%
ROA
21.5%
Health
Liquidity and balance-sheet strength
Debt / equity
0.11x
Current ratio
4.18x
Quick ratio
2.00x
Total debt
$441.50M
Total cash
$204.70M
Growth
How the business has been compounding
Revenue TTM
$8.75B
Revenue 5Y CAGR
8.1%
EPS TTM
1.17
EPS 5Y CAGR
4.9%
Cash flow
How much cash the business throws off
Operating CF TTM
$1.40B
Free CF TTM
$1.05B
FCF margin
12.0%
Dividend
Shareholder payout
Yield
1.9%
Payout ratio
78.6%
Last ex-div date
2026-07-28