VeriSign, Inc.

Each forensic score reads differently. The Beneish M-Score of -2.839 is below the -1.78 threshold, so it is not in the elevated manipulation-risk zone. This is a statistical screen for patterns that sometimes accompany earnings manipulation, so a reading outside the elevated zone does not guarantee that the reported numbers are clean. The Altman Z″-Score of -27.29 falls in the distress zone. That label is driven largely by the balance sheet, where liabilities of $3.48 billion exceed assets of $1.33 billion, and it is a screening model rather than a forecast of failure, particularly since the company reported operating income of $1.12 billion and operating cash flow of $1.09 billion in 2025. The Piotroski F-Score is 7 of 7 computable signals, meaning every signal the data could compute came out favorable across profitability, cash generation, and balance-sheet trend tests. Operating cash flow divided by net income of 1.32 means cash generation ran ahead of reported net income of $825.7 million in 2025. The filings describe a business concentrated in .com and .net registrations, where the company has contractual room to raise prices: up to 7% per year in the final four years of each six-year period under the .com Registry Agreement through November 30, 2030, and up to 10% per year on .net through June 30, 2029. The board declared a $0.81 per-share dividend on April 20, 2026, and $862.8 million remained available for share repurchases as of March 31, 2026, so capital is being returned to shareholders even though equity is negative. Readers may want to look at how the .com fee increase interacts with renewal rates and with the cyber and DDoS costs described in the risk factors.

Catalyst.Revenue rose 6.4% to $1.66 billion in 2025, and operating income increased to $1.12 billion from $1.06 billion. The 10-Q MD&A attributes current growth to a larger .com and .net domain name base, which reached 176.1 million as of March 31, 2026, up 3.7% from a year earlier, along with the .com and .net price increases. First-quarter 2026 revenue was $428.9 million, up 7%, and the final renewal rate for the fourth quarter of 2025 was 75.0%, compared with 74.0% a year earlier. On April 23, 2026, the company also announced that the .com registry-level wholesale fee will rise from $10.26 to $10.97 effective November 1, 2026.

Hidden risk.Total liabilities of $3.48 billion exceed total assets of $1.33 billion at the end of 2025, leaving equity at negative $2.15 billion, and that deficit widened from negative $1.96 billion in 2024. Operating cash flow in the first quarter of 2026 was $272.4 million, down from $291.3 million a year earlier, while the company repurchased $214.4 million of its shares in the quarter. The 10-K risk factors describe a high rate of cyber-attacks, DDoS attacks, and AI-enabled social engineering, and state that the company does not maintain specific reserves for security breaches and that its insurance may be inadequate.