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What this page is: Delvantic's full research page for J.B. Hunt Transport Services, Inc. (JBHT) — AI-driven forensic equity research: mechanical valuation models (DCF, EPV, anchored-PE, scenario) plus three independent AI lenses (Quality / Value / Sentiment). Everything below is rendered server-side; you are not missing content that requires JavaScript. All scores are predictions and research opinions, not financial advice.
Our current read (analysis of 2026-10-08): Designation Low · Gem Score -24 (−100…+100 Quality+Value blend) · Quality 36 · Value -64 · Sentiment -42 (timing only, not weighted) · Composite fair value $117.36 vs $265.47 at analysis
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profile-header/price-overview— company profile, live quote, market capextended-analysis— the core: three AI lens reads with findings, scores, and the analyst memofuture-predictions— our forward price-band predictionsmarket-narrative/ai-findings/gpt-critique— narrative context, cross-model findings, and an adversarial critique of our own analysis (near the end of the document)- Members-only sections (render as login gates for anonymous readers):
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J.B. Hunt Transport Services, Inc.
JBHT NASDAQJ.B. Hunt Transport Services, Inc. is a North American transportation and logistics company that provides surface transportation, delivery, brokerage, and supply chain services. The company serves businesses across a wide range of industries through five main segments: Intermodal, Dedicated Contract Services, Integrated Capacity Solutions, Final Mile Services, and Truckload. Its operations combine company-controlled equipment, third-party carriers, and rail-linked freight movement to help move goods efficiently across the United States, Canada, and Mexico. J.B. Hunt also offers specialized logistics solutions such as freight brokerage, private fleet conversion, last-mile delivery, and full-truckload shipping. Headquartered in Lowell, Arkansas, J.B. Hunt Transport Services plays a significant role in freight movement and logistics execution for shippers seeking broad network coverage and multi-mode transportation capabilities.
Price Overview
Price History (1 Year)
Revenue & Net Income Trend
| Period | Revenue | Net Income | Net Margin | YoY/QoQ |
|---|
Key Metrics
EPS (Diluted): 6.12
Total Equity: $3.57B
Shares: 97,688,000
Total Debt: $1.47B
Cash: $17.28M
EBITDA: $1.58B
Total Debt: $1.47B
Cash: $17.28M
Revenue: $12.00B
Revenue: $12.00B
Revenue: $12.00B
Total Equity: $3.57B
Tax Rate: 24.7%
Equity: $3.57B
Total Debt: $1.47B
Cash: $17.28M
Current Liabilities: $1.94B
Long-Term Debt: $766.94M
Total Debt: $1.47B
Total Equity: $3.57B
Shares: 97,688,000
Shares: 97,688,000
CapEx: -$730.69M
Shares: 97,688,000
Stock Price: $265.47
Net Income: $598.28M
Industry Benchmarks
Income Statement (Annual)
Last updated: Sep 1, 2026 5:41am (37d ago)| Metric | 2021 | 2022 | 2023 | 2024 | 2025 |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Revenue | $12.2B | $14.8B | $12.8B | $12.1B | $12.0B |
| Cost of Revenue | — | — | — | — | — |
| Gross Profit | — | — | — | — | — |
| Operating Expenses | $11.1B | $13.5B | $11.8B | $11.3B | $11.1B |
| Operating Income | $1.0B | $1.3B | $993.2M | $831.2M | $865.1M |
| Net Income | $760.8M | $969.4M | $728.3M | $570.9M | $598.3M |
| EBITDA | $1.6B | $2.0B | $1.7B | $1.6B | $1.6B |
| EPS | $7.22 | $9.31 | $7.04 | $5.60 | $6.16 |
| EPS (Diluted) | $7.14 | $9.21 | $6.97 | $5.56 | $6.12 |
Balance Sheet (Annual)
Last updated: Sep 1, 2026 5:30am (37d ago)| Metric | 2022 | 2022 | 2023 | 2024 | 2025 |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Cash & Equivalents | — | $51.9M | $53.3M | $47.0M | $17.3M |
| Total Current Assets | — | $2.2B | $2.1B | $1.8B | $1.6B |
| Total Assets | — | $7.8B | $8.5B | $8.3B | $7.9B |
| Current Liabilities | — | $1.6B | $1.8B | $1.7B | $1.9B |
| Long-Term Debt | $1.3B | $1.3B | $1.3B | $977.7M | $766.9M |
| Total Liabilities | — | $4.1B | $4.4B | $4.3B | $4.4B |
| Total Equity | — | $3.7B | $4.1B | $4.0B | $3.6B |
| Retained Earnings | — | $6.4B | $7.0B | $7.4B | $7.8B |
Cash Flow (Annual)
Last updated: Sep 1, 2026 5:51am (37d ago)| Metric | 2021 | 2022 | 2023 | 2024 | 2025 |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Operating Cash Flow | $1.2B | $1.8B | $1.7B | $1.5B | $1.7B |
| Capital Expenditure | -$947.6M | -$1.5B | -$1.9B | -$865.4M | -$730.7M |
| Free Cash Flow | $276.3M | $236.1M | -$117.8M | $617.8M | $947.6M |
| Acquisitions (net) | $0 | -$118.2M | -$85.0M | $3.8M | $0 |
| Net Debt Issued / (Repaid) | $0 | -$350.0M | $0 | -$250.0M | $250.0M |
| Dividends Paid | -$124.4M | -$166.7M | -$173.9M | -$175.5M | -$171.0M |
| Stock Buybacks | -$151.7M | -$300.0M | -$159.6M | -$513.9M | -$923.3M |
| Net Change in Cash | $42.2M | -$303.6M | $1.4M | -$6.4M | -$29.7M |
Growth Trends (YoY %)
Last updated: Sep 1, 2026 5:41am (37d ago)| Metric | 2022 | 2023 | 2024 | 2025 |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Revenue Growth | +21.7% | -13.4% | -5.8% | -0.7% |
| Gross Profit Growth | — | — | — | — |
| Operating Income Growth | +27.4% | -25.4% | -16.3% | +4.1% |
| Net Income Growth | +27.4% | -24.9% | -21.6% | +4.8% |
| EBITDA Growth | +23.3% | -12.4% | -8.0% | -0.8% |
Dividend History (Last 20)
Last updated: Sep 1, 2026 5:30am (37d ago)| Date | Dividend | Declaration | Record | Payment |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| 2026-08-07 | $0.45 | — | — | — |
| 2026-05-08 | $0.45 | — | — | — |
| 2026-02-06 | $0.45 | — | — | — |
| 2025-11-07 | $0.44 | — | — | — |
| 2025-08-08 | $0.44 | — | — | — |
| 2025-05-09 | $0.44 | — | — | — |
| 2025-02-07 | $0.44 | — | — | — |
| 2024-11-08 | $0.43 | — | — | — |
| 2024-08-02 | $0.43 | — | — | — |
| 2024-05-09 | $0.43 | — | — | — |
| 2024-02-08 | $0.43 | — | — | — |
| 2023-11-09 | $0.42 | — | — | — |
| 2023-08-03 | $0.42 | — | — | — |
| 2023-05-11 | $0.42 | — | — | — |
| 2023-02-09 | $0.42 | — | — | — |
| 2022-11-03 | $0.40 | — | — | — |
| 2022-08-04 | $0.40 | — | — | — |
| 2022-05-12 | $0.40 | — | — | — |
| 2022-02-03 | $0.40 | — | — | — |
| 2021-11-04 | $0.30 | — | — | — |
Deep Analysis
Risk : Reward — upside vs downside from this company's own quarters
Computed 2026-10-08 02:00A +1σ run of quarters pays -69%; a −1σ run costs 86%. Ratio -0.8:1 (μ 2.9%, σ 10.3% , 16 pairs).
Older method (repeat-worst-quarter): -0.3 : 1
| Case | Growth | Margin | Fair value | vs price ($265.47) |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Bull — recovery | +10% | 17.3% | $199.24 | -25% |
| Base — stabilizes | +6% | 15.0% | $157.61 | -41% |
| Bear — keeps slipping | +3% | 12.8% | $122.03 | -54% |
| Stress — last quarter repeats | -2% | 5.8% | $51.86 | -80% |
| Upside — a +1σ run of quarters (v2) | +13% | 5.8% | $82.40 | -69% |
| Stress — a −1σ run of quarters (v2) | -7% | 4.9% | $36.86 | -86% |
Narrative Economics
market-narrative step).
Growth Outlook
Analyzed 2026-09-01 06:03The question every valuation on this page silently assumes: is this company likely to grow? Judged forward — the business, its category, the world — against what's already printed.
Claude Reading
Looking at the raw quarterly tape first: revenue troughed at $2.92B in Q1'25 and has climbed six quarters to $3.50B in Q2'26 — that's +20% off the bottom, and the Q2'26 print is the highest in the visible series, above the $3.15B Q4'24 comparable. Net income margin has recovered from 4.0% to 5.2% but is still well shy of the 6.5%+ margins JBHT posted in 2021-2022 when it earned $969M on $14.8B. TTM net income is roughly $675M; at $24.9B market cap that's ~37x, and on 2022 peak earnings of $969M it's a still-rich 26x. FCF of $948M against $25B cap = 3.8% yield, decent but not cheap for a capital-intensive trucking/rail intermodal hybrid with $1.47B debt and $17M cash (a startlingly thin cash position). ROIC of 13% is respectable but not moat-grade, and it's compressed from mid-teens historically.
I largely agree with the synthesis direction — JBHT is expensive — but the $94 DCF fair value strikes me as too punitive and the market-forces "avoid" call misses that the cycle is visibly inflecting in the tape. Q2'26 revenue accelerating to $3.50B (+19% YoY vs Q2'25's $2.93B) is not a company "trapped in freight recession"; that's the recovery print. The narrative model's framing of a 181% premium priced on "monopoly forever" is directionally right but overstates the gap — if you normalize earnings to a mid-cycle $850M-$900M NI (halfway between 2025's $598M trough and 2022's $969M peak), you get ~28x normalized, which is expensive for a cyclical but not absurd for the intermodal franchise with BNSF. Fair value in the $150-180 range on normalized earnings at 20-22x is more defensible than $94.
The contrarian case the models under-weight: JBHT's intermodal segment genuinely does have structural tailwinds from truck-to-rail conversion, ELD-driven trucking capacity discipline, and the BNSF partnership is not easily replicable — Schneider and Hub Group can't match the container fleet scale. If Q2'26's acceleration continues and margins mean-revert toward 7-8% net (they hit 8%+ in 2022), 2027 EPS could push $9-10 vs the ~$6.50 TTM run-rate, making the forward multiple look more like 27x rather than 40x. That's still not cheap, but it's the bull's actual math, not "TAM of imagination." What's genuinely troubling: current ratio 0.83, $17M cash on a $25B enterprise, and FCF conversion that has weakened (operating CF $1.68B but capex $731M is heavy and structural). The "Weak Cash Flow Quality" flag deserves attention — accruals building during a recovery is a yellow flag for earnings quality.
Where the models contradict themselves usefully: pre-flight calls this "traditional/mature" while the narrative layer tags it "platform-monopoly" with strong intensity — both are partially right, and the tension is the whole trade. The stock is priced as a platform, operates as a cyclical asset-heavy carrier, and the delta is the risk. Revenue CAGR of -3.3% over five years is the tell: this is not a compounder growing into its multiple, it's a cyclical that de-rated less than earnings did. I dissent on the magnitude of overvaluation ($94 is too low) but agree on direction. At $265 you're paying for both cycle recovery AND multiple maintenance, and only one of those is likely to deliver. A patient buyer waits for $200 or lower — roughly 22x normalized — where cycle optionality is free. Anyone long here needs Q3'26 to confirm the margin recovery, or the 40x optical multiple compresses fast when growth-momentum funds rotate.
GPT Reading
At $265, the market is paying an elite multiple for a business that is currently producing ordinary cyclical freight economics. The clearest fact pattern is this: revenue peaked at $14.81B in 2022, fell to $12.83B in 2023, then to $12.09B in 2024 and $12.00B in 2025. So three years after peak freight conditions, JB Hunt still has not rebuilt the top line. Operating income shows the same reset: $1.33B in 2022, $993M in 2023, $831M in 2024, and only $865M in 2025. Net income of $598M in 2025 is barely above 2024’s $571M and still far below $969M in 2022. Yet the stock trades at 43.4x earnings, 17.2x EV/EBITDA, 2.16x sales, and 7.27x book. For a transporter with a 7.2% operating margin and 5.0% net margin, that is a growth-stock valuation without growth-stock financials.
The recent quarter progression does show recovery, but not enough to justify the premium. Revenue moved from $2.92B and $2.93B in the first two quarters of 2025 to $3.06B in 1Q26 and $3.50B in 2Q26; net income rose from $117.7M and $128.6M to $141.6M and $181.0M. On a year-over-year basis, 2Q26 revenue is up about 19% from $2.93B and net income up roughly 41% from $128.6M, which is real improvement. But even after that rebound, net margin is just 5.2%, only modestly better than 4.4% a year ago, and still nowhere near the earnings power implied by the stock price. Annualizing the last two quarters gets you something like $645M of earnings, which still leaves the stock around the high-30s P/E. The market is effectively capitalizing a full freight-cycle normalization today, before it has shown up in annual results.
Cash flow is the best part of the story, but even there I would not stretch. 2025 operating cash flow of $1.68B and free cash flow of $948M are strong against a $24.9B market cap, but that is still only about a 3.8% FCF yield. For a cyclical capital-intensive operator that spent $731M in capex and carries $1.47B of debt against just $17M of cash, 3.8% is not obviously cheap. Debt is manageable at 0.41x equity, and ROIC at 13% is respectable, which supports a premium to weaker truckers or brokers. But “respectable” is the operative word: these are good franchise numbers, not monopoly numbers. The current ratio below 0.83 also reminds you this is a working-capital-heavy, operationally intense business, not some software-like logistics platform that deserves to ignore the cycle.
The best argument against my bearish read is that the stock is discounting a sharp earnings snapback, and there is evidence for that. Quarterly revenues are accelerating, recent earnings are growing again, and the company’s BNSF-linked intermodal franchise plus broader integrated service offering likely deserves a premium versus commodity freight peers. If JB Hunt can get back even halfway toward 2022 profitability, say $900M-$1.0B of net income, today’s valuation would compress quickly into the mid-20s P/E range, which investors may accept for a best-in-class logistics compounder. Bulls will also point out that 2025 operating cash flow was nearly 3x net income, suggesting depreciation and working-capital dynamics leave more owner earnings than headline EPS implies. I weigh that less heavily because the market is not asking me to buy at 18x normalized earnings; it is asking me to underwrite a premium multiple on a cyclical recovery that remains incomplete.
What would change my mind is not another narrative about network density or end-to-end logistics, but hard evidence that earnings power is structurally re-rating. Specifically, I would want to see at least two to three consecutive quarters with revenue above $3.4B and net margins sustained above 6.5%, which would imply annual net income moving decisively toward $800M+. I would also want to see operating margin push back toward 9% from the current annual 7.2%, without a blowout in capex or leverage. If that happens, the current price starts to look like an early-cycle call on normalized earnings rather than an overpayment for a good operator in a still-mediocre freight market. Until then, this looks like a high-quality company priced for a recovery that is much further advanced in the stock than in the financial statements.
Grok Reading
J.B. Hunt at $265 is a classic late-cycle multiple trap. Annual revenue has slid from the 2022 peak of $14.81B to $12.00B in 2025, a −3.3% CAGR, while net income compressed from $969M to $598M. Operating margin sits at 7.2% and net margin at 5.0%—respectable for freight, but nowhere near the economics that justify a 43× P/E, 17.2× EV/EBITDA, or 7.3× book. The balance sheet is clean enough (D/E 0.41, $1.47B debt against $3.57B equity) and free cash flow of $948M on $1.68B operating cash flow shows the franchise still converts, yet cash is a token $17M and the current ratio of 0.83 signals working-capital tightness typical of a volume-driven carrier fighting for share. Recent quarters do show sequential lift—Q2 2026 revenue $3.50B and $181M net income at 5.2% margin versus the soft $2.92–2.93B prints of early 2025—but that acceleration is still only clawing back toward mid-cycle run-rates, not rewriting the earnings power that would support a $25B equity value.
The quantitative models calling the stock ~65% overvalued (composite fair value near $94–103) are directionally correct and, if anything, understate how narrative-dependent the current price is. A 2.2× sales multiple and 43× trough earnings embed a full reversion to 2021–22 peak EPS in the $8–10 range *plus* a sustained premium multiple that the industry has rarely awarded outside of temporary scarcity spikes. ROIC of 13% and ROE of 17% are solid mature-earner returns, not platform-monopoly returns; they do not underwrite the “operating system for North American logistics” story that is carrying the last 100-plus points of the share price. Weak FCF quality flags and below-sector benchmarks reinforce that the market is paying for an inflection that has not yet produced durable pricing power or margin expansion beyond mid-single digits.
The strongest opposing case starts from the same recent data: Q2 2026’s $3.50B revenue print and the 4.8% earnings YoY uptick show the cycle turning, the BNSF intermodal franchise remains a genuine scarce asset that asset-light brokers cannot replicate, and Final Mile gives real optionality on big-and-bulky e-commerce. If earnings recover fully to the $900M–1B net-income zone and the market continues to treat JBHT as a compounder rather than a trucker, a mid-20s multiple on $9–10 of EPS could theoretically justify prices near today’s level. I weigh that case lightly because it requires *both* a complete earnings rebound *and* a permanent re-rating above historical freight multiples; history shows the second leg collapses the moment capacity returns or shippers push back. The 181% premium to DCF is almost pure narrative duration, not incremental cash-flow visibility, and narrative durability in a cyclical, driver-constrained industry is moderate at best.
I would flip only on sustained evidence that the recovery is structural rather than cyclical: four consecutive quarters of revenue above $3.6B with operating margins holding above 8%, or clear demonstration that intermodal and dedicated pricing is decoupling from spot truckload rates while ROIC pushes through 18%. Absent that, the stock is a high-quality franchise priced for perfection in a still-imperfect freight market.
Big-3 Panel — where each AI stands
Advanced Analysis Forensic deep-dive · separate lenses
JBHT prints high-integrity earnings: OCF/NI of 2.25x, accruals at -11.7% of assets, and an Altman Z of 6.63 all point to conservative, cash-backed reporting. Capital discipline is real - diluted shares fell from 106.6M in 2021 to 97.7M in 2025 (-2.2% CAGR) with buybacks running 576% of SBC, and SBC itself is a modest 0.6% of revenue. FCF rebounded hard to $947.6M in 2025 after a negative-FCF year in 2023, and the business is self-funding.
Verify before trusting this (5)
- Segment mix (Intermodal vs Dedicated vs ICS vs JBT) and which segment is driving margin compression
- Customer concentration and contract repricing cadence coming out of the freight downcycle
- Maturity schedule and rates on the $1.45B net debt, particularly the $699.9M short-term portion
- Capex intensity vs tractor/container fleet age - is 2025 FCF strength partly underinvestment?
- Insider transaction pattern to confirm alignment with buyback discipline
Price is $265.47 against an e2e composite FV of $103.42 and signal-adjusted FV of $94.31, with DCF at $62.48 and EPV floor at $45.22. Even the most generous method in the stack, anchored P/E at $243.49, sits below the tape. That constellation says the market is paying up for a mid-cycle earnings normalization plus a durable network premium, not for trailing cash flows. Earnings quality is high, so no haircut is warranted, but that only firms up the deserved number, not the price. Company-quality is only Solid (36) with three years of revenue and margin erosion, so I will not stretch the deserved multiple to bail out the tape. A fair deserved range, giving credit to the anchored-PE method and the franchise, is roughly $150 to $200, still 25 to 45% below spot. This is Rich, not Overvalued, because DCF/EPV on a trough year understate a normalized earnings power that a real recovery would restore, but the burden of proof is squarely on the bulls.
Verify before trusting this (5)
- Intermodal volume and pricing inflection in next 1-2 quarters
- Operating margin trajectory in Dedicated and Intermodal versus 2022 peak
- Free cash flow run-rate and buyback pace at current price
- Net debt and leverage covenants given the balance-sheet constraint
- Any guidance revision that changes normalized EPS anchor
The macro tape is mildly risk-on with a soft VIX, but that is a weak tailwind for a beta-1.3 cyclical industrial whose story depends on volumes and pricing power, not liquidity. With the 10y at 4.73% and market PE stretched, capital is not rotating into freight; it is chasing AI and growth. JBHT sits in the wrong cohort for this tape. The narrative is the pressure point: 'integrated logistics platform / de facto OS of North American freight' is a strong story but only moderately durable, and price action ( -3.3% CAGR, negative momentum) shows the market is quietly discounting it. Every quarter the freight recession drags on, the monopoly framing erodes and the cyclical framing reasserts. News flow is thin and defensive - management talking up in-house drayage as an edge in a driver-short market is a tell that the operating environment is still tight and margin-pressured, not a growth catalyst. Net: no active de-rating event, but a persistent, low-grade headwind from a fading narrative and an unsupportive sector rotation, only partially offset by the calm tape.
Verify before trusting this (4)
- Any sell-side downgrades or target cuts that would confirm a narrative shift from 'platform' to 'cyclical'
- Intermodal volume and pricing data points - a positive inflection would revive the platform story
- Rotation signals into industrials/transports (rails, truckers) as a group
- Whether a Fed pivot or curve steepening triggers a cyclical/reflation trade that lifts freight names
North American surface freight is emerging from an extended overcapacity trough: goods demand is flat-to-steady rather than booming, but marginal truckload capacity attrition and rising diesel/labor costs improve the economics of rail-linked intermodal — a genuine structural conversion tailwind for the largest container network. Against that, the freight complex remains a shrinking, low-margin pool where shippers hold pricing power in bid season, and higher-for-longer rates plus trade-policy volatility keep import-driven volume uncertain. The world favors scaled, integrated networks taking share within a stagnant category rather than category-wide expansion.
When we made this prediction on Sep 1, 2026, JBHT was $255.64. We expect it to be $226.00 by Mar 2027, and we consider it great value under $180.00. This is an early model (v0.6.0) — the direction is more reliable than the exact price. Made Sep 1, 2026.
Blue is our prediction, starting the day we made it. Grey is a slower route to the same place — the same destination, taking longer. Black is the actual price, so you can see how we are doing.
Post-Report Due Diligence UNSETTLED
Evidence for a closer look, not a verdict — no score or designation on this page has been changed by it. Items marked material are ones where a conclusion above moves to the other side of the price.
trailing_eps
flips up 5%
adjusted_pe
flips up 5%