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What this page is: Delvantic's full research page for Synchrony Financial (SYF) — 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 Watch · Gem Score +34 (−100…+100 Quality+Value blend) · Quality 36 · Value 32 · Sentiment -27 (timing only, not weighted) · Composite fair value $66.46 vs $76.62 at analysis
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Synchrony Financial
SYF NYSESynchrony Financial is a consumer financial services company that provides credit products, installment lending, and banking services across the United States. The company specializes in private-label, co-branded, and general-purpose credit cards, along with promotional financing and point-of-sale lending programs for retail, health and wellness, home, auto, travel, and other partner industries. Through its banking platform, Synchrony Financial also offers FDIC-insured savings products that support its broader consumer finance ecosystem. Its business model is centered on connecting consumers with financing at the point of purchase while helping merchants and service providers offer branded credit solutions. With a strong focus on digitally enabled financial products, Synchrony Financial plays a significant role in consumer credit, retail financing, and partner-based lending services.
Price Overview
Price History (1 Year)
Revenue & Net Income Trend
| Period | Revenue | Net Income | Net Margin | YoY/QoQ |
|---|
Key Metrics
EPS (Diluted): 10.55
Total Equity: $16.77B
Shares: 336,681,447
Total Debt: $15.18B
Cash: $14.97B
EBITDA: N/A
Total Debt: $15.18B
Cash: $14.97B
Revenue: $14.98B
Revenue: $14.98B
Revenue: $14.98B
Total Equity: $16.77B
Tax Rate: 23.1%
Equity: $16.77B
Total Debt: $15.18B
Cash: $14.97B
Current Liabilities: N/A
Long-Term Debt: $15.18B
Total Debt: $15.18B
Total Equity: $16.77B
Shares: 336,681,447
Shares: 336,681,447
CapEx: $0.00
Shares: 336,681,447
Stock Price: $76.62
Net Income: $3.55B
Industry Benchmarks
Income Statement (Annual)
Last updated: Sep 2, 2026 2:48am (36d ago)| Metric | 2021 | 2022 | 2023 | 2024 | 2025 |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Revenue | $10.2B | $11.7B | $13.6B | $16.1B | $15.0B |
| Cost of Revenue | — | — | — | — | — |
| Gross Profit | — | — | — | — | — |
| Operating Expenses | $2.0B | $2.2B | $2.4B | $2.4B | $2.6B |
| Operating Income | — | — | — | — | — |
| Net Income | $4.2B | $3.0B | $2.2B | $3.5B | $3.6B |
| EBITDA | — | — | — | — | — |
| EPS | $7.40 | $6.19 | $5.21 | $8.64 | $10.92 |
| EPS (Diluted) | $7.34 | $6.15 | $5.19 | $8.55 | $10.55 |
Balance Sheet (Annual)
Last updated: Sep 2, 2026 2:30am (36d ago)| Metric | 2021 | 2022 | 2023 | 2024 | 2025 |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Cash & Equivalents | $8.3B | $10.3B | $14.3B | $14.7B | $15.0B |
| Total Current Assets | — | — | — | — | — |
| Total Assets | $95.7B | $104.6B | $117.5B | $119.5B | $119.1B |
| Current Liabilities | — | — | — | — | — |
| Long-Term Debt | $14.5B | $14.2B | $16.0B | $15.5B | $15.2B |
| Total Liabilities | $82.1B | $91.7B | $103.6B | $102.9B | $102.3B |
| Total Equity | $13.7B | $12.9B | $13.9B | $16.6B | $16.8B |
| Retained Earnings | $14.2B | $16.7B | $18.7B | $21.6B | $24.6B |
Cash Flow (Annual)
Last updated: Sep 2, 2026 3:41am (36d ago)| Metric | 2021 | 2022 | 2023 | 2024 | 2025 |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Operating Cash Flow | $7.1B | $6.7B | $8.6B | $9.8B | $9.9B |
| Capital Expenditure | — | — | — | — | — |
| Free Cash Flow | — | — | — | — | — |
| Acquisitions (net) | — | $0 | $0 | -$1.9B | -$161.0M |
| Net Debt Issued / (Repaid) | — | — | — | — | — |
| Dividends Paid | -$500.0M | -$434.0M | -$406.0M | -$398.0M | -$427.0M |
| Stock Buybacks | -$2.9B | -$3.3B | -$1.1B | -$1.0B | -$2.9B |
| Net Change in Cash | — | — | — | — | — |
Growth Trends (YoY %)
Last updated: Sep 2, 2026 2:48am (36d ago)| Metric | 2022 | 2023 | 2024 | 2025 |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Revenue Growth | +14.5% | +16.7% | +18.3% | -7.1% |
| Gross Profit Growth | — | — | — | — |
| Operating Income Growth | — | — | — | — |
| Net Income Growth | -28.5% | -25.8% | +56.3% | +1.5% |
| EBITDA Growth | — | — | — | — |
Dividend History (Last 20)
Last updated: Aug 31, 2026 9:30am (37d ago)| Date | Dividend | Declaration | Record | Payment |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| 2026-08-05 | $0.34 | — | — | — |
| 2026-05-05 | $0.30 | — | — | — |
| 2026-02-06 | $0.30 | — | — | — |
| 2025-11-05 | $0.30 | — | — | — |
| 2025-08-05 | $0.30 | — | — | — |
| 2025-05-05 | $0.30 | — | — | — |
| 2025-02-03 | $0.25 | — | — | — |
| 2024-11-04 | $0.25 | — | — | — |
| 2024-08-05 | $0.25 | — | — | — |
| 2024-05-03 | $0.25 | — | — | — |
| 2024-02-02 | $0.25 | — | — | — |
| 2023-10-31 | $0.25 | — | — | — |
| 2023-07-28 | $0.25 | — | — | — |
| 2023-05-01 | $0.23 | — | — | — |
| 2023-02-03 | $0.23 | — | — | — |
| 2022-10-31 | $0.23 | — | — | — |
| 2022-07-29 | $0.23 | — | — | — |
| 2022-04-29 | $0.22 | — | — | — |
| 2022-02-09 | $0.22 | — | — | — |
| 2021-10-29 | $0.22 | — | — | — |
Deep Analysis
Risk : Reward — upside vs downside from this company's own quarters
Computed 2026-09-02 04:06| Case | Growth | Margin | Fair value | vs price ($76.62) |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Bull — recovery | -4% | 27.0% | $75.43 | -2% |
| Base — stabilizes | -7% | 23.5% | $59.65 | -22% |
| Bear — keeps slipping | -11% | 20.0% | $46.47 | -39% |
Narrative Economics
market-narrative step).
Growth Outlook
Analyzed 2026-09-02 04:01The 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
Starting with the raw tape: Synchrony printed $3.55B NI on $14.98B revenue in 2025 (23.7% net margin, 21.2% ROE), and the 2026 quarterly cadence — $805M then $885M — annualizes to roughly $3.4B, so earnings are holding, not collapsing. But note the revenue line: 2024 was $16.13B, 2025 was $14.98B (-7.1% YoY), meaning net interest income is compressing while earnings hold via lower provisions and buybacks. That's the actual tension in this name — not "melting ice cube" versus "cash machine," but a shrinking top line masked by credit normalization tailwinds and share count reduction. At 7.3x earnings, 1.54x book, with a 21% ROE and $9.85B in operating cash flow against a $25B market cap, this is priced for either an EPS cliff or a permanent ROE reset to sub-cost-of-capital.
The synthesis verdict of $180 fair value (+135%) is nonsense on stilts and I'd dissent hard from the magnitude even while agreeing with the direction. A DCF that spits out $180 on a subprime-heavy consumer lender is almost certainly running a normalized-credit assumption through a low discount rate without penalizing for the fact that SYF's earnings are structurally cyclical and the 21% ROE reflects a benign-loss environment plus aggressive capital return, not a durable moat. A sober fair value: if you capitalize $3.3-3.5B of through-cycle earnings at 9-10x (appropriate for a monoline card issuer with partner concentration risk), you get $100-115/share — call it 30-50% upside, not 135%. The market-forces "melting ice cube" call overweights the BNPL narrative; Affirm and Klarna have been eating share for six years and Synchrony still grew EPS 58% cumulatively from 2023 to 2025. The bear case is real but slower than advertised.
The contrarian pushback I take seriously: recent revenue YoY of -7.1% is not noise — it's the Capital One/Walmart partnership loss showing up, and partner concentration (Amazon, Walmart-successor, Lowe's, PayPal) means one more defection resets the earnings base by 10-15%. The 26% earnings CAGR is a reserve-release illusion; provisions were extraordinarily elevated in 2023 ($2.24B NI on $13.63B rev = 16% margin) and have since normalized, which is a one-time tailwind that won't repeat. Insider activity is pure comp vesting — 156, 203, 14-share awards tell you nothing. The narrative layer correctly notes this is a mechanics story, not a belief story, meaning re-rating requires actual charge-off data, not sentiment shift. If NCOs re-accelerate in 2026 H2 (consumer stress signals are building), the 7x multiple compresses to 5-6x and the stock is $55, not $115.
Net: I agree with the synthesis *direction* (undervalued) but dissent sharply on the *magnitude*. The prior models are anchored to a DCF that ignores cyclicality and partner concentration; the market-forces model overweights BNPL disruption that has been slow-moving for years. Fair value is $100-115, not $180. At $76.62 you're paying 7.3x for a business earning through the cycle at 15-18% ROE with a 1.6% dividend and 10%+ of the float bought back annually — that's an asymmetric setup where you clip 8-10% total return from capital return alone while waiting for either multiple expansion or being proven wrong by a credit shock. The Q4 2025 print of $751M NI (softest quarter in the sequence) is the tell to watch — if that becomes the new run-rate rather than a seasonal dip, my fair value drops to $85-90. Starter position warranted, not a table-pound.
GPT Reading
Synchrony screens optically cheap, but the raw data does not support the kind of extreme undervaluation claim implied by a $180 fair value. This is a lender, not a software annuity, so the right question is durability of earnings and return on equity through the credit cycle. On that score, the data say “good franchise, late-cycle earnings power, not a screaming bargain.” At $76.62, SYF trades at 7.3x 2025 earnings of $3.55B and about 1.54x book on $16.77B of equity. That sounds low until you notice book is already earning a very strong 21.2% ROE, helped by a still-favorable rate environment for card yields. If this were a stable 20%+ ROE business with low cyclicality, 1.5x book would be cheap; for a private-label card lender exposed to consumer credit normalization, it looks closer to fair. The income line reinforces that. Annual revenue fell from $16.13B in 2024 to $14.98B in 2025, down 7.1%, while net income only rose from $3.50B to $3.55B. Flat-ish profit on shrinking revenue is not a growth story; it usually means mix, reserve, or spread dynamics are offsetting pressure temporarily.
The quarterly sequence also reads more cyclical than secularly compounding. Net income moved from $789M in 3Q24 and $774M in 4Q24 to $757M in 1Q25, then rebounded to $967M and $1.08B in 2Q–3Q25 before dropping back to $751M in 4Q25, then $805M and $885M in the first half of 2026. That is perfectly acceptable profitability, but it does not show a clean upward staircase that would justify paying up for growth. What stands out to me is resilience, not expansion: SYF is earning roughly $3.2B-$3.6B annualized across a choppy period. That deserves respect, especially with operating cash flow of $9.85B and near-offsetting cash and debt of $14.97B versus $15.18B. Balance-sheet leverage is real but not alarming for the model, with debt/equity at 0.91, and the 1.6% dividend with a 12% payout ratio leaves room for buybacks or stress absorption. In other words, this is a solid mature earner, but mature earners should be valued on normalized returns, not on peak-multiple DCF outputs.
The key contradiction I see is between the “deep value” framing and the actual market cap versus earnings/book. A $24.93B market cap against $3.55B of net income is cheap on earnings, yes, but not absurd for a consumer lender whose 2021-2025 earnings path swung from $4.22B to $3.02B to $2.24B and back to $3.50B-$3.55B. That history matters. It shows Synchrony can print excellent profits, but also that its earnings base is highly sensitive to credit conditions and provisioning. Likewise, 2025 net margin of 23.7% looks strong, but for a financial company that figure can flatter reality because revenue recognition and provision timing can move differently from ultimate credit economics. I do not buy the “melting ice cube” caricature from the bearish narrative engine, but I also do not buy that a lender with sub-5% revenue CAGR over five years and negative recent revenue growth should be worth anything close to 12x-13x current earnings. My read is simpler: the stock is pricing in a normal amount of consumer-credit skepticism, not a broken business.
The strongest case against my view is straightforward: a 21% ROE business at 1.54x book and 7x earnings is often too cheap if returns persist even moderately. If SYF can sustain anything near $3.5B of earnings through a tougher credit backdrop, then today’s valuation leaves meaningful upside, because even 9x earnings would imply roughly $95 and 10x implies around $106 before considering capital return. The balance sheet is better than many reflexive bears assume given nearly matched cash and debt, and the profit trend since 2023 is materially improved from the $2.24B trough. A bull would also point out that 2026 quarterly net income has so far exceeded the comparable 2025 first-quarter run rate, with $805M and $885M versus $757M and $967M in the prior-year quarters, suggesting earnings are holding in a range rather than collapsing. That argument has teeth, and it is the reason I am not bearish here. I just weigh the revenue decline from $16.13B to $14.98B and the cyclicality of historical earnings more heavily than the low headline P/E.
What would change my mind is evidence that earnings quality is improving, not merely surviving. If 2026 can deliver at least $3.6B-$3.8B of net income on stabilizing or rising revenue versus 2025’s $14.98B, I would move more constructive because that would suggest SYF is defending both spread and credit quality without cannibalizing growth. I would also want to see book value compound fast enough to justify a premium to today’s 1.54x book. On the downside, if quarterly earnings slip back toward the 2023-type annual run rate under $3.0B, then the stock is not cheap at all and deserves something closer to 1.1x-1.3x book, which would point to material downside from $76. For now, the market is roughly right: this is a good lender priced as a cyclical lender.
Grok Reading
Synchrony is printing real cash while the tape treats it like a broken franchise. At $76.62 on a $24.9B market cap, the stock trades at 7.3x trailing earnings against $3.55B of 2025 net income and a 21.2% ROE—numbers that would ordinarily screen as cheap for a deposit-funded consumer lender with $9.85B of operating cash flow and near net-cash balance sheet geometry ($15.18B debt versus $14.97B cash, 0.91 D/E). Net margin held at 23.7% even as revenue fell from $16.13B in 2024 to $14.98B in 2025, a 7.1% contraction that management absorbed without surrendering the earnings floor; sequential quarterly NI has re-accelerated into mid-2026 ($805M then $885M) after the $751M December trough. The payout is only 12% on a 1.6% yield, so the capital-return capacity is not priced. The market is not debating whether Synchrony earns money today—it is debating whether $3.5B is a mid-cycle run-rate or a late-cycle mirage.
The contradiction that matters is between that earnings resilience and a top line that is already melting. Revenue CAGR over the multi-year window is a sluggish 4.9%, and the latest annual print went backward; earnings CAGR of 26% is optically strong only because 2023’s $2.24B trough reset the base, while 2021’s $4.22B peak still sits unchallenged. That pattern is classic late-cycle credit: provisions ease, NI expands, then the portfolio shrinks or losses re-accelerate. Private-label and dual-card economics remain partner-concentrated; BNPL and bank-card competitors do not need to win the whole wallet to compress Synchrony’s intercept rates and merchant economics. A 1.54x book multiple on a 21% ROE business looks like a gift only if charge-offs stay well-behaved and retail partners renew on acceptable terms—assumptions the 7x multiple explicitly refuses.
I reject the composite fair-value stack near $180–$198 as model theater. Capitalizing $3.5B at a full mid-cycle 11–12x multiple already implies roughly $105–$120 before any growth premium; jumping to 2.3x the current price requires durable high-teens ROE, stable or rising receivables, and credit losses that never revisit the ugly side of the cycle. The data do not grant that. ROA is only 3.0%, so the ROE is leverage- and funding-dependent, not franchise-monopoly economics. Insider activity is noise—tiny awards, no open-market conviction. The “fallen angel / melting ice cube” narrative is fragile precisely because one bad charge-off quarter collapses the multiple further; there is no growth mythology to cushion the miss.
The strongest opposing case is straightforward and numerate: revenue is already down 7%, historical NI has swung from $4.22B to $2.24B to $3.55B inside four years, and consumer credit is late-cycle with elevated leverage and rising delinquencies industry-wide. A smart bear cites partner defection risk, deposit-cost pressure if rates re-tighten, and the fact that credit-services names earn single-digit P/Es when the market smells normalization—not because analysts cannot do DCF arithmetic, but because loss-rate tails destroy equity value faster than buybacks rebuild it. I weigh that risk as real but already more than half-reflected at 7.3x and 1.7x sales: the stock is priced for permanent impairment, not for a garden-variety credit wiggle. Flat-to-up NI through a revenue down-year and fortress operating cash flow argue the franchise still clears a high bar for mid-cycle profitability. That does not make it a double; it makes the current discount excessive relative to demonstrated earnings power.
What flips me is concrete. Three consecutive quarters of rising 30+/90-day delinquencies or net charge-offs that push the full-year NI run-rate sustainably below $2.8B would confirm the bear’s structural-break thesis and push me to fairly valued or worse. Conversely, a return to positive revenue growth with stable loss rates, or a major partner re-up that expands receivables without margin giveaway, would justify closing toward a 10–11x earnings band and raise conviction sharply. Until then, the tape is too cheap on current cash generation and too complacent only if you believed the $180 models.
Big-3 Panel — where each AI stands
Advanced Analysis Forensic deep-dive · separate lenses
Synchrony is a mature private-label credit card issuer generating $3.0-4.2B in net income annually over the last five years on $10-16B of revenue, with 2025 revenue of $14.98B and net income of $3.55B. Operating cash generation is robust (FCF around $9.85B in 2024 and 2025), and accruals are negative (-4.5% of assets) with OCF/NI at 2.67x, both supportive of earnings integrity - though for a lender these ratios are structurally noisy because 'FCF' largely reflects receivables funding dynamics rather than a clean owner-earnings figure. The Altman Z of 0.56 flagging distress is a false positive: the model is not built for banks/lenders whose balance sheets are dominated by loan receivables and deposit/wholesale funding. Capital return is the standout: diluted share count has fallen from 575M in 2021 to 337M in 2025, a -12.5% CAGR - roughly 41% of the float retired in four years, an unusually aggressive per-share value concentration. Insider activity is neutral (routine grants, no meaningful open-market buys or sells). The main structural concerns are what the numbers don't show: credit losses, funding mix, and partner concentration (notably the loss of the Walmart relationship historically and reliance on a small number of large retail partners) are real business-quality issues that live in the 10-K, not this file.
Verify before trusting this (6)
- Net charge-off rate and reserve coverage trajectory in the latest 10-Q/10-K
- Top-partner concentration (Amazon, PayPal, Lowe's, Sam's Club, etc.) and program renewal calendar
- Funding mix - deposits vs. wholesale/securitization - and cost of funds sensitivity
- Capital ratios (CET1) and regulatory buffer supporting the buyback pace
- CFPB late-fee rule status and any earnings impact
- Whether reported FCF reflects true owner earnings for a lender or is distorted by receivables funding classification
Price is $76.62 against a composite fair value of $198.58 and signal-adjusted $180.11 implying 135% upside. I don't take that at face value — a 2.5x gap on a mature, cyclical card issuer almost always means the anchored-PE method is capitalizing peak-cycle earnings without discounting credit normalization. Card issuers structurally trade at 7-10x earnings because the market correctly prices in credit cyclicality; a DCF or PE anchor that ignores that will always look 'undervalued.' Sanity-checking: $3B+ net income on a $24.9B cap is ~7-8x earnings, which is a normal-to-cheap multiple for the group, not a screaming discount.
Verify before trusting this (5)
- Net charge-off trajectory and management's normalized loss guidance
- Reserve build vs delinquency migration in latest 10-Q
- Retail partner renewal terms (Amazon, PayPal, Lowe's)
- Buyback pace vs remaining authorization
- Deposit cost trends as rates shift
The macro tape is essentially neutral (VIX 16, S&P barely off highs) so there is no risk-off wave to amplify SYF's 1.31 beta right now. What pressure exists is idiosyncratic: SYF sits in the consumer-credit cohort, where the prevailing narrative is delinquency normalization and consumer stress, and that story presses harder on subprime-tilted card issuers like Synchrony than on the broader financials complex. The narrative itself is described as minimal-intensity and fragile - meaning the market is not actively re-rating the name in either direction, it is simply refusing to give it credit for the DCF gap. Momentum tells the same story: a decent 3-year build but a -7.1% recent drawdown versus a 4.9% trend, consistent with a name being quietly faded rather than dumped. Higher-for-longer rates (10y 4.75%) and a stretched market PE are a mild headwind for a levered consumer lender, but SYF's funding is FDIC deposits, which mutes the rate-sensitivity story relative to pure-play consumer finance peers. Net: the non-fundamental pressure is a light, persistent headwind from the credit-cycle narrative, offset by a calm tape and no active de-rating catalyst - close to balanced, tilting slightly negative.
Verify before trusting this (4)
- Next monthly credit metrics release - a stable or improving delinquency print could flip the fragile narrative
- Any large-bank commentary on card losses that either validates or undercuts the consumer-stress story
- Whether the -7.1% recent move extends or bases - continuation would signal the headwind is intensifying
- Sell-side target revisions or downgrades tied to charge-off assumptions
The world Synchrony operates in is a late-cycle US consumer: employment still funding payments, but leverage high and the 10-year at 4.75 keeping funding costs and household debt service elevated. That environment rewards underwriting discipline over growth, which is exactly the trade Synchrony has made — shrinking the top line to protect credit. Structurally, the checkout point is the contested ground: embedded lending and BNPL keep chipping at the private-label card's position, while partner retailers hold the customer relationship and extract economics at each renewal. Offsetting that, health-and-wellness financing is a genuine secular pool (elective care, dental, veterinary) where Synchrony has a real incumbency. Net: no world-level force is going to make this a fast grower, and none is obviously going to break it either. The likely path is a flat-to-slightly-growing receivables base with earnings power carried by pricing, credit normalization and share count reduction.
When we made this prediction on Sep 2, 2026, SYF was $78.41. We expect it to be $108.00 by Mar 2027, and we consider it great value under $68.00. This is an early model (v0.6.0) — the direction is more reliable than the exact price. Made Sep 2, 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.