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What this page is: Delvantic's full research page for Kenvue Inc. (KVUE) — 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 -27 (−100…+100 Quality+Value blend) · Quality -13 · Value -37 · Sentiment -26 (timing only, not weighted) · Composite fair value $16.17 vs $19.06 at analysis
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Kenvue Inc.
KVUE NYSEKenvue Inc. is a global consumer health company focused on over-the-counter medicines, personal care, and wellness products for everyday use. Headquartered in Summit, New Jersey, Kenvue develops and markets a broad portfolio of well-known brands across categories such as pain relief, allergy care, cough and cold, digestive health, baby care, skincare, and oral care. Its products include widely recognized names such as Tylenol, Zyrtec, Benadryl, Neutrogena, Aveeno, Listerine, Johnson’s, Band-Aid, and Visine, which are distributed through pharmacies, mass retailers, e-commerce platforms, and healthcare channels worldwide. Kenvue’s business is organized around meeting consumer needs in self-care and daily health routines, offering non-prescription solutions that support hygiene, symptom relief, and skin and hair health. By combining brand recognition, large-scale distribution, and consumer insight-driven product development, Kenvue plays a significant role in the consumer health market, serving households, caregivers, and professionals across multiple regions.
Price Overview
Price History (1 Year)
Revenue & Net Income Trend
| Period | Revenue | Net Income | Net Margin | YoY/QoQ |
|---|
Key Metrics
EPS (Diluted): 0.76
Total Equity: $10.77B
Shares: 1,924,000,000
Total Debt: $1.45B
Cash: $1.06B
EBITDA: $2.97B
Total Debt: $1.45B
Cash: $1.06B
Revenue: $15.12B
Revenue: $15.12B
Revenue: $15.12B
Total Equity: $10.77B
Tax Rate: 26.5%
Equity: $10.77B
Total Debt: $1.45B
Cash: $1.06B
Current Liabilities: $5.95B
Long-Term Debt: $0.00
Total Debt: $1.45B
Total Equity: $10.77B
Shares: 1,924,000,000
Shares: 1,924,000,000
CapEx: -$475.00M
Shares: 1,924,000,000
Stock Price: $19.06
Net Income: $1.47B
Industry Benchmarks
Income Statement (Annual)
Last updated: Aug 24, 2026 6:50am (44d ago)| Metric | 2022 | 2023 | 2023 | 2024 | 2025 |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Revenue | $15.1B | $15.0B | $15.4B | $15.5B | $15.1B |
| Cost of Revenue | $6.6B | $6.7B | $6.8B | $6.5B | $6.3B |
| Gross Profit | $8.4B | $8.3B | $8.6B | $9.0B | $8.8B |
| Operating Expenses | $5.5B | $5.6B | $6.1B | $7.1B | $6.4B |
| Operating Income | $2.9B | $2.7B | $2.5B | $1.8B | $2.4B |
| Net Income | $2.1B | $2.1B | $1.7B | $1.0B | $1.5B |
| EBITDA | $3.7B | $3.3B | $3.1B | $2.5B | $3.0B |
| EPS | $1.21 | $1.20 | $0.90 | $0.54 | $0.77 |
| EPS (Diluted) | $1.21 | $1.20 | $0.90 | $0.54 | $0.76 |
Balance Sheet (Annual)
Last updated: Aug 24, 2026 6:30am (44d ago)| Metric | 2023 | 2023 | 2023 | 2024 | 2025 |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Cash & Equivalents | $1.2B | $1.2B | $1.4B | $1.1B | $1.1B |
| Total Current Assets | $5.9B | — | $6.1B | $5.5B | $5.7B |
| Total Assets | $27.3B | — | $27.9B | $25.6B | $27.1B |
| Current Liabilities | $3.9B | — | $5.5B | $5.7B | $5.9B |
| Long-Term Debt | $0 | — | $7.7B | — | — |
| Total Liabilities | $7.3B | — | $16.6B | $15.9B | $16.3B |
| Total Equity | $20.0B | — | $11.2B | $9.7B | $10.8B |
| Retained Earnings | $0 | — | $429.0M | -$93.0M | -$204.0M |
Cash Flow (Annual)
Last updated: Aug 24, 2026 6:50am (44d ago)| Metric | 2022 | 2023 | 2023 | 2024 | 2025 |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Operating Cash Flow | $334.0M | $2.5B | $3.2B | $1.8B | $2.2B |
| Capital Expenditure | -$295.0M | -$375.0M | -$469.0M | -$434.0M | -$475.0M |
| Free Cash Flow | $39.0M | $2.2B | $2.7B | $1.3B | $1.7B |
| Acquisitions (net) | — | — | — | — | — |
| Net Debt Issued / (Repaid) | — | — | — | — | — |
| Dividends Paid | $0 | $0 | -$766.0M | -$1.6B | -$1.6B |
| Stock Buybacks | — | $0 | -$7.0M | -$235.0M | -$197.0M |
| Net Change in Cash | $122.0M | $491.0M | $151.0M | -$312.0M | -$8.0M |
Growth Trends (YoY %)
Last updated: Aug 24, 2026 6:50am (44d ago)| Metric | 2023 | 2023 | 2024 | 2025 |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Revenue Growth | -0.7% | +3.3% | +0.1% | -2.1% |
| Gross Profit Growth | -1.6% | +4.3% | +3.7% | -1.9% |
| Operating Income Growth | -8.4% | -6.1% | -26.7% | +31.1% |
| Net Income Growth | -0.7% | -19.4% | -38.1% | +42.7% |
| EBITDA Growth | -9.1% | -5.4% | -21.5% | +20.6% |
Dividend History (Last 20)
Last updated: Aug 19, 2026 12:14pm (49d ago)| Date | Dividend | Declaration | Record | Payment |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| 2026-08-12 | $0.21 | — | — | — |
| 2026-05-13 | $0.21 | — | — | — |
| 2026-02-11 | $0.21 | — | — | — |
| 2025-11-12 | $0.21 | — | — | — |
| 2025-08-13 | $0.21 | — | — | — |
| 2025-05-14 | $0.21 | — | — | — |
| 2025-02-12 | $0.21 | — | — | — |
| 2024-11-13 | $0.21 | — | — | — |
| 2024-08-14 | $0.21 | — | — | — |
| 2024-05-07 | $0.20 | — | — | — |
| 2024-02-13 | $0.20 | — | — | — |
| 2023-11-07 | $0.20 | — | — | — |
Deep Analysis
Risk : Reward — upside vs downside from this company's own quarters
Computed 2026-10-05 02:00A +1σ run of quarters pays -31%; a −1σ run costs 56%. Ratio -0.6:1 (μ 1.0%, σ 3.5% , 14 pairs).
Older method (repeat-worst-quarter): -0.2 : 1
| Case | Growth | Margin | Fair value | vs price ($19.06) |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Bull — recovery | +2% | 17.3% | $17.24 | -10% |
| Base — stabilizes | +2% | 15.0% | $14.75 | -23% |
| Bear — keeps slipping | +1% | 12.8% | $12.37 | -35% |
| Stress — last quarter repeats | -3% | 10.7% | $9.16 | -52% |
| Upside — a +1σ run of quarters (v2) | +5% | 11.8% | $13.10 | -31% |
| Stress — a −1σ run of quarters (v2) | -3% | 9.5% | $8.46 | -56% |
Narrative Economics
market-narrative step).
Growth Outlook
Analyzed 2026-08-24 07:00The 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
The raw quarterly tape tells a more constructive story than the annual CAGR suggests. Sequential revenue has stepped up cleanly: $3.66B (Q4'24) → $3.74B → $3.84B → $3.76B → $3.78B → $3.91B → $3.96B, with the two most recent quarters clocking ~$7.87B combined vs $7.40B in the year-ago pair — call it +6.4% first-half YoY, not the -2.1% the trailing momentum stat implies. Net margin has stabilized in the 10-12% band after the Q4'24 trough of 8%, and the last two quarters printed 12.1% and 11.5% — the best margin pair in the disclosed history. Whoever computed "recent_revenue_yoy: -2.1%" is either reading Q4'25 vs Q4'24 (a soft cold/flu comp) or averaging stale periods; the current-quarter trajectory is inflecting positively, and the synthesis engine seems to have missed this.
That said, the annual picture the bears cite is real: 2025 revenue of $15.12B is *below* 2023's $15.44B and roughly flat with 2022's $15.05B — four years of no top-line growth. FCF fell from ~$2.7B implied peak to $1.72B (-20% CAGR), and the 107.5% payout ratio means the 4.4% dividend is being funded partly out of balance sheet slack, not earnings. Debt/equity of 0.135 and only $1.06B cash against $1.45B debt give some room, but not indefinitely — either earnings recover to ~$1.75-2.0B (covering the ~$1.6B dividend) or the payout gets trimmed. The Q1-Q2 2026 earnings run-rate of ~$1.86B annualized actually gets them there, which materially changes the dividend-cut thesis the bears are leaning on.
The prior models are directionally reasonable but internally inconsistent. Pre-flight calls it a "show-me story" at 25x depressed earnings; synthesis lands at $17.89 fair value (-6% downside); market-forces says "premium it hasn't earned"; narrative layer says "priced correctly on fundamentals." These don't fully cohere — if the narrative engine is right that fundamentals anchor price, then the -6% synthesis gap is noise, not signal. My contrarian read: the 25x PE is on trailing depressed earnings ($1.47B NI in 2025); on the H1'26 annualized run-rate of ~$1.86B, forward PE drops to ~19.7x, and EV/EBITDA around 10-11x — that's not premium for a stable CPG with 58% gross margins and a durable brand portfolio. Colgate trades ~22x, P&G ~24x, Church & Dwight ~26x. Kenvue at 19-20x forward with margin recovery underway is closer to cheap-relative than expensive.
The contrarian bear case worth taking seriously: 2024's revenue decline and 2025 flat-lining could reflect real category erosion (Tylenol autism-lawsuit overhang, private-label incursion in skincare, GLP-1s suppressing OTC demand), and the Q1-Q2'26 acceleration could be one-off pricing or Kenvue-specific product cycles rather than a durable inflection. Insider activity is unhelpful noise — awards and one small 3,700-share sale tell you nothing. Roe of 13.7% and ROIC of 15.9% are respectable but not distinguished for a staples name. I'd want to see Q3'26 confirm the trend before pounding the table. Still, at $19.06 with a 4.4% yield that's likely defensible on the recovering earnings base, and a forward multiple that's below staples peers, I disagree with the synthesis "fair value" verdict — this looks modestly undervalued, with fair value closer to $22-24 if the 12% margin holds and revenue growth stays positive. I'd dissent on direction but not violently; conviction is medium because the two-quarter improvement needs one more print to be trend rather than noise.
GPT Reading
Kenvue looks like a decent business priced like a better one. The core fact pattern is stagnation: 2025 revenue was $15.12B, down from $15.46B in 2024 and barely different from $15.44B in 2023 or $15.05B in 2022. On an eight-quarter view, quarterly sales have lived in a narrow $3.66B-$3.96B band. There is some recent improvement — the June 2026 quarter at $3.96B was up about 3% from $3.84B a year earlier, and March 2026 at $3.91B was up about 5% from $3.74B — but that only repairs part of a multi-year flatline. Meanwhile earnings have been more cyclical than a staples multiple usually deserves: annual net income fell from $2.08B in 2022 to $1.03B in 2024 before rebounding to $1.47B in 2025. The business is not broken, but the market is paying 25.1x earnings and 12.4x EV/EBITDA for a company whose revenue CAGR is negative and whose earnings power still sits well below where it was three years ago.
The more favorable reading is that 2025 may have marked an earnings trough and the margin rebuild is real. Operating income improved from $1.84B in 2024 to $2.41B in 2025 despite lower revenue, and quarterly net margins have stepped up from 8.0%-8.7% in late 2024/early 2025 to 11.5%-12.1% in the first half of 2026. If I annualize the last two quarters, earnings power is closer to $1.86B-$1.90B than the reported $1.47B for 2025, which would bring the effective P/E down into the high teens or around 20x. That is not crazy for a defensive branded consumer health company with 58.1% gross margin, 15.9% operating margin, 15.9% ROIC, modest balance-sheet leverage of just $1.45B debt against $1.06B cash, and $1.72B of free cash flow. But even giving credit for that recovery, you are still not buying growth; you are buying stabilization, cost takeout, and a 4.4% dividend yield.
That dividend is exactly where I think the market is being too charitable. A 107.6% payout ratio on annual earnings is a yellow flag even if free cash flow covers it better than EPS suggests. With $1.72B of FCF on a $36.6B market cap, the FCF yield is only about 4.7%, barely above the dividend yield, leaving little room for both generous distributions and meaningful reinvestment unless margins keep improving. That is a thin spread for a company with a current ratio below 1.0 and no meaningful top-line growth engine. The stock is not egregiously expensive in absolute terms, but the burden of proof is wrong: at $19.06, investors are already capitalizing a successful standalone transition and a durable earnings recovery, while the evidence so far is mostly “less bad” rather than “structurally better.” I land slightly below the current price, with fair value more like $16.50-$18 depending on whether you underwrite roughly $1.6B or closer to $1.9B of sustainable net income.
The best case against my caution is straightforward: this is exactly the sort of stock where screens can mislead because they anchor on depressed trough earnings. If the June and March 2026 quarters are the new run rate, then annualized revenue is approaching $15.7B-$15.8B and annualized net income is near $1.9B, which would make today’s valuation much more reasonable for a recession-resistant, brand-heavy defensive name. Gross margin above 58% and improving net margin suggest genuine pricing power and cost discipline, not just accounting noise. The balance sheet is also stronger than many staples peers, with net debt of only about $390M, so there is little financial risk. On that view, 19x-20x normalized earnings plus a 4.4% yield is not expensive; it is a fair entry point for a stable compounder that will never look optically cheap.
What would change my mind is evidence that the recent margin recovery is accompanied by clean volume-backed growth, not just mix and cost savings. If the next two quarters can hold revenue above $3.9B and keep net margin at 11%+, that would support a sustainable earnings base near $1.8B-$1.9B and justify the stock around or above $19. Conversely, if revenue slips back toward the $3.7B-$3.8B range or margins retreat into the 8%-9% zone, the current multiple is too high and the shares should trade closer to the mid-teens. The key is simple: this stock needs to prove it is a recovering franchise, not merely a flat franchise wearing a defensive multiple.
Grok Reading
Kenvue’s numbers describe a post-spin cash cow that has arrested the worst of its earnings trough but has not yet earned a growth multiple. Annual revenue slipped from $15.46B in 2024 to $15.12B in 2025 (−2.2%), extending a multi-year pattern of essentially flat-to-down top-line (revenue CAGR −1%). Net income recovered to $1.47B from the depressed $1.03B print in 2024, and the last two reported quarters show sequential strength—$3.91B and $3.96B in sales with net margins of 12.1% and 11.5%—but absolute earnings remain well below the $2.06–2.08B generated in 2021–22. Free cash flow of $1.72B on $2.20B operating cash flow is the cleanest quality signal in the file; gross margin holds at a respectable 58%, ROIC is 15.9%, and the balance sheet is lightly levered ($1.45B debt against $10.77B equity, D/E 0.135). The market is paying 25× trailing earnings, 12.4× EV/EBITDA and 2.42× sales for a business whose volume is not growing and whose dividend payout sits at 108% of net income. That is a premium staples multiple on a no-growth earnings base, only partially justified by the 4.4% yield.
The story the models under-weight is the payout and the structural top-line. A 107% payout ratio means the $4.4% yield is being funded partly by balance-sheet capacity or by treating FCF as permanent rather than by covered earnings; FCF covers the dividend more comfortably than NI, but the gap is a yellow flag if earnings re-compress. Recent revenue “acceleration” is still only a bounce from $3.74–3.78B quarters back toward the mid-$3.9Bs—hardly evidence of brand re-acceleration in OTC pain, skin, or oral care. Operating income of $2.41B in 2025 looks better than 2024’s $1.84B, yet it remains below the $2.51–2.92B range of the J&J-era years, consistent with stranded-cost and scale friction after the 2023 separation. At $19.06 the stock sits roughly 6% above the composite fair-value band near $18; that gap is small in absolute dollars but meaningful when the underlying business is shrinking 1–2% a year and the multiple already prices successful cost takeout.
The strongest contrary case is that 2025 was an inflection year, not a dead-cat bounce. Earnings jumped 43% year-over-year off the trough, quarterly net margins have climbed into the low double digits, and FCF conversion remains excellent. Low leverage and a current ratio near 1.0 leave room to keep returning cash while management finishes the standalone cost program. Consumer-health brands of Tylenol/Neutrogena/Listerine vintage historically defend price in inflation and hold shelf space; if organic sales simply stabilize at zero rather than −2% and operating margin grinds toward the high teens, a mid-teens free-cash-flow yield on the enterprise and a covered 4%+ dividend become a perfectly rational holding for income allocators. In that framing, 12× EV/EBITDA is not egregious for defensive staples, and the “show-me” discount the pre-flight note describes has already mostly closed.
I would flip to a constructive stance if the next two print quarters deliver positive organic sales growth (not just easy comparisons) above +1–2% with net margins sustaining above 11%, and if the trailing payout ratio falls below ~85% on higher earnings rather than a dividend cut. A clear path to sub-12× forward EV/EBITDA on rising EBIT, or a sustained FCF run-rate above $2B that fully covers an intact dividend, would also re-rate the equity from slightly rich to fairly valued. Until one of those arrives, the stock looks like a high-quality income vehicle priced ~5–8% ahead of its fundamental anchor.
Big-3 Panel — where each AI stands
Advanced Analysis Forensic deep-dive · separate lenses
Kenvue is a recently spun-out consumer health company (Tylenol, Neutrogena, Listerine parent) showing the signature profile of a mature staples earner: revenue essentially flat at ~$15B across four years (15.05, 14.95/15.44, 15.46, 15.12), gross margins actually expanding modestly from 55.9% to 58.1%, and FCF running $1.72B on the trailing print with OCF/NI of 1.3x. Accruals are negative (-1.2% of assets), Beneish M at -2.47 shows no manipulation flags, and cash conversion is strong — the reported earnings appear real. Earnings quality is a genuine strength.
Verify before trusting this (5)
- Cause of OpM decline from 19.4% to 11.9% in 2024 — restructuring, one-time separation costs, or structural?
- Talc litigation exposure and indemnification arrangement with J&J post-spin
- Debt maturity ladder and refinancing plan for the $1.45B short-term debt
- Segment-level growth (Self Care vs Skin Health vs Essential Health) to see where stagnation is concentrated
- SBC grant/vest schedule and any planned buyback authorization to gauge future dilution trajectory
The composite fair value of $18.06 and signal-adjusted FV of $17.89 sit just below the $19.06 price, implying roughly -6% downside rather than any discount. The DCF ($18.24) and EPV floor ($10.90) both anchor below spot; only the anchored-PE method ($24.84) suggests upside, and that reflects peer multiples on a business the quality lens flags as stagnating with margin slippage - so I would not lean on it. Earnings quality is high, which validates the FV inputs rather than requiring a haircut. Nothing here suggests the market has mispriced the story: the steady-compounder narrative is fully in the price, and the bear case (mature OTC categories, share dilution outpacing buybacks) is not being discounted either. This is a solid staples business trading at a solid staples price. For a true margin of safety against a Solid (not Wide-Moat) business with flat growth, I want to buy meaningfully below the DCF, not at or above it.
Verify before trusting this (4)
- Organic revenue growth trajectory in Skin Health and Self Care segments
- Gross margin recovery cadence vs input-cost normalization
- Share count trend - is dilution from RSUs still outpacing buybacks
- Any guidance revision on 2025 EPS or FCF conversion
Kenvue sits in the sleepiest corner of the market right now: a consumer-defensive with beta 0.43, no active story, and a 'steady-compounder' archetype rated minimal intensity. The macro tape is modestly risk-on (+32), which is actually a mild relative headwind for defensives like KVUE - money rotates toward higher-beta cyclicals when VIX is 15 and the S&P is near highs, leaving staples as funding sources. But because the intensity is so low and beta so muted, that pressure barely lands. On the other side, the 10y at 4.69% and a market PE of 25.8 give a bond-proxy dividend name like KVUE a persistent low-grade drag - staples struggle when real yields stay elevated. The bear whisper (mature categories, at-home diagnostics eroding OTC) is a durable narrative overhang but not currently intensifying. The bull case (habitual brand demand, cash return) is equally quiet. Analyst tone and news flow don't show a catalyst either way. Net: this is a stock the tape mostly ignores. Small headwind from rotation-out-of-defensives and rate pressure on yield names, offset by the absence of any narrative crack or negative news cycle. Balanced with a faint downward tilt.
Verify before trusting this (4)
- Any activist or strategic-review headline (KVUE has been rumored as a break-up candidate) - would flip narrative intensity overnight
- Tylenol volume trends and any litigation flare-ups that could ignite a negative news cycle
- Whether staples underperformance widens if the risk-on regime deepens beyond its nascent 1-day read
- Analyst target revisions - currently quiet; a downgrade cluster would signal narrative shift
The world is moving toward self-directed health — more OTC self-treatment, pharmacist-led recommendation, aging populations, and consumers substituting home care for clinic visits. That is structurally supportive of Kenvue's shelf. Working against it: shopper willingness to buy store-brand actives has never been higher, retailers are the ones deciding shelf economics, and public scrutiny of long-trusted actives (acetaminophen especially) is rising in a way that can reprice trust faster than any marketing budget can rebuild it. Digital/e-commerce shifts the fight from brand recall to search-and-review, where private label competes on equal footing. Net: the demand pool is intact and slowly growing; the pricing umbrella over branded OTC is the thing genuinely at risk over years, not the volume.
When we made this prediction on Aug 24, 2026, KVUE was $19.30. We expect it to be $18.10 by Feb 2027, and we consider it great value under $15.50. This is an early model (v0.6.0) — the direction is more reliable than the exact price. Made Aug 24, 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 NOTES
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 down 25%
adjusted_pe
flips down 25%