One-glance verdict
Undervalued
$15.85 our estimate vs market $3.68
Wall Street consensus: $12.00 (-24.3% lower than our fair-value estimate)
77% below our estimate, below the bear case
Fundamentals snapshot
Proficient Auto Logistics, Inc.
PAL · NMS · Industrials · Integrated Freight & Logistics
Current price
$3.68
52-week range
$3.60 - $10.97
Market cap
$103.23M
Balance sheet
Distressed
-1.18x Concerning
Net debt $74.27M. Interest coverage shows how many times profit covers the interest bill.
What stands out
2 Rewards
3 Risks
2 rewards · 3 risks
- Reward Revenue grew 78.7% last year.
- Reward Free cash flow was positive in 4/10 years.
- Risk Insider ownership is only 14.2% (peer median: 50.9%).
- Risk Operating margin compressed from 11.3% to -2.9% over 3 years.
What this company does
Proficient Auto Logistics, Inc.
Proficient Auto Logistics is a specialized trucking company that moves new cars from factories and ports to dealership lots. It gets paid by automakers and rental car companies for each delivery, so its business does well when car sales are strong. This makes the company a key link in the automotive supply chain (the journey a product takes from creation to the customer), as it gets vehicles to the final point of sale.
How the company got here
Proficient Auto Logistics is a relatively new name for a company built from long-standing businesses. It was officially formed in 2023 and became a major force in the auto transport industry after its Initial Public Offering (IPO, the first time a company sells its stock to the public) in May 2024. On its first day as a public company, it acquired five different regional auto-hauling companies, combining them into one large national network. This approach, known as a 'roll-up' strategy, involves buying multiple smaller companies in the same industry to create a much larger and more competitive one. Since then, the company has continued to acquire other carriers to expand its reach across North America.
What it actually does
In simple terms, Proficient Auto Logistics moves cars from point A to point B. It is a specialized trucking company that transports finished vehicles for major car manufacturers like General Motors and Tesla, as well as electric vehicle makers. The company picks up new cars from factories, ports where they arrive on ships, or rail yards and delivers them to local car dealerships where people buy them. It also serves customers like rental car companies, auto auctions (where used cars are sold in bulk), and car leasing companies.
Company Drivers
This is the part of the business where Proficient Auto Logistics uses its own fleet of trucks and its own employees to move vehicles. Major automakers and their logistics partners pay the company to transport vehicles using these company-owned assets. This segment generates revenue (the money a company brings in from sales) by hauling cars for both big manufacturing contracts and for other customers in the secondary market, like car auctions. This is the larger of its two main business lines.
Subhaulers
This segment operates on what's called an 'asset-light' model, meaning it doesn't rely on using its own trucks. Instead, Proficient acts as a manager or broker, arranging for other, independent transportation companies (called subhaulers or contracted carriers) to move vehicles for its customers. The company makes money by managing the logistics and connecting the customer's shipping needs with a third-party trucker who can perform the delivery. This provides flexibility and allows the company to handle more shipments than its own fleet could alone.
What management is betting on now
Management's main strategy is to continue growing by acquiring other auto transport companies to increase its size and national footprint. A key goal is to become the largest and most reliable car-hauling network in North America. By combining these different companies, they aim to improve efficiency through initiatives like 'load sharing' (coordinating shipments between its various regional businesses to reduce the number of trucks driving empty). This focus on scale (getting bigger) and operational excellence is how the company plans to navigate the ups and downs of the auto industry and serve its large manufacturing customers better.
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.
FY2025 Q1
$-1.01M
FY2025 Q2
$11.27M
FY2026 Q1
$1.20M
FY2026 Q2
$-3.09M
Revenue
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Net income
$-3.90M
Diluted EPS
-0.14
Operating cash flow
$-1.25M
Free cash flow
$-3.09M
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Sources
Revenue
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Net income
$-6.49M
Diluted EPS
-0.23
Operating cash flow
$1.98M
Free cash flow
$1.20M
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Sources
Revenue
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Net income
$-28.25M
Diluted EPS
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Operating cash flow
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Free cash flow
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Revenue
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Net income
$-3.02M
Diluted EPS
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Revenue
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Net income
$-1.56M
Diluted EPS
-0.06
Operating cash flow
$11.59M
Free cash flow
$11.27M
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Sources
Revenue
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Net income
$-3.19M
Diluted EPS
-0.12
Operating cash flow
$1.63M
Free cash flow
$-1.01M
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Revenue
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Net income
$12.74M
Diluted EPS
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Free cash flow
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Revenue
$91.51M
Net income
$-1.37M
Diluted EPS
-0.05
Operating cash flow
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Is it cheap or expensive?
Fair value $15.85 vs current price $3.68
Wall Street consensus is the average analyst price target: $12.00 (-24.3% lower than our fair-value estimate).
Our most-likely fair value is $15.85 a share — about 330.8% above today's price of $3.68, so the stock currently looks cheap (undervalued).
Is it drowning in debt?
Distressed
Net debt $74.3M. Interest coverage -1.2x.
Net debt
$74.27M
Interest coverage
-1.18x
Proficient Auto Logistics, Inc.'s profit covers its interest bill about 0.0 times over. which is weaker than most peers shown here and 1 peers sit below 1x, which is the danger zone where profit does not fully cover the interest bill.
Distressed
Worse cushion
Baseline
Better cushion
PAL
BASELINE
Proficient Auto Logistics, Inc.
Total debt $82.40M Interest coverage -1.18x This is the baseline the peer rows are being compared against.
Total debt $838.52M Interest coverage 1.23x This peer still has a real interest-payment cushion, while PAL does not.
Total debt $324.43M Interest coverage 1.70x This peer still has a real interest-payment cushion, while PAL does not.
Total debt $146.40M Interest coverage -5.38x Neither company has much profit cushion over interest right now.
Total debt $396.10M Interest coverage 5.00x This peer still has a real interest-payment cushion, while PAL does not.
What you should know
The case for and against PAL
2 Rewards
3 Risks
Rewards
-
Revenue grew 78.7% last year.
-
Free cash flow was positive in 4/10 years.
Risks
-
Insider ownership is only 14.2% (peer median: 50.9%).
-
Operating margin compressed from 11.3% to -2.9% over 3 years.
-
Return on equity was -13.0% last year — the company lost money on shareholders' equity.
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)
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Forward P/E
6.48x
P/B
0.34x
P/S
0.24x
EV/EBITDA
7.26x
PEG ratio
0.33x
Profitability
How much profit each dollar creates
Gross margin
17.4%
Operating margin
-2.9%
Net margin
-9.9%
ROE
-13.0%
ROA
-2.0%
Health
Liquidity and balance-sheet strength
Debt / equity
0.27x
Current ratio
1.18x
Quick ratio
1.03x
Total debt
$82.40M
Total cash
$8.13M
Growth
How the business has been compounding
Revenue TTM
$422.76M
Revenue 5Y CAGR
49.0%
EPS TTM
-1.51
EPS 5Y CAGR
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Cash flow
How much cash the business throws off
Operating CF TTM
$13.95M
Free CF TTM
$29.28M
FCF margin
6.9%
Dividend
Shareholder payout
Yield
—
Payout ratio
0.0%
Last ex-div date
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