Fidelity National Information Services, Inc. (FIS)
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symbol.quality_heading
The business works in principle, but one material question is open. As long as it stays open, our findings do not carry a quality verdict.
The business demonstrably works: $10,677 million of revenue in 2025 built on recurring contracts, adjusted segment margins of 43.7 and 51.6 percent in the first quarter of 2026, $2,608 million of operating cash flow and $1,619 million free after capital spending. What is open is a genuine operating question: whether the swap of January 9, 2026 was worth its price is unproven — the acquired business delivered $591 million of revenue and $35 million of pre-tax income in eleven weeks against a $13,473 million purchase price, and 91.8 percent of that price sits as goodwill, intangibles and software in a provisional balance sheet. Nothing supports red: equity is clearly positive at $15,980 million, interest coverage sits above two, liquidity is $3.5 billion, ratings remain investment grade, and the business throws off cash every quarter. Green is out of reach until the integration is proven — especially with debt up eight billion in a single quarter. The decision is yours.
symbol.quality_note
On January 9, 2026 FIS traded its Worldpay stake for the Issuer Solutions business of Global Payments and paid 7.7 billion dollars in cash on top. The quarter that followed carries the highest earnings per share in company history: $4.58. The company's own comparison table in the very same filing puts that quarter at $187 million instead of $2,366 million. We read the quarterly report, the annual report and the filings covering the swap and the new notes. Anyone reading the headline here is reading the wrong page.
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Stock Watch
This analysis is as of July 26, 2026. Stock Watch will tell you what's changed at FIS since then.
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Basics
Performance
Valuation
Profitability
Balance Sheet & Safety
Growth
Dividend
Quality & Screener
AI Rating
Uses AIFIS bettet künstliche Intelligenz nach eigener Darstellung im Geschäftsbericht 2025 quer durch Lösungen und Betrieb ein, setzt KI-Modelle in der Betrugserkennung produktiv ein und baut die KI-Fähigkeiten der Kernprodukte zusammen mit Partnern aus — verkauft aber kein eigenständiges KI-Produkt und ist durch KI auch nicht in seinem Geschäftsmodell bedroht.
View the full file — quotes, sources, reviewed filings
„As we advance our transformation into a platform company, we are embedding artificial intelligence (“AI”) across our solutions and operations."
Während wir unsere Wandlung zu einem Plattform-Unternehmen vorantreiben, betten wir künstliche Intelligenz („KI“) in alle unsere Lösungen und Abläufe ein.
„We are expanding AI capabilities of our key solutions through a combination of in-house development and partnership with industry leaders, with a focus on agentic capabilities and the development of select use cases in collaboration with clients."
Wir bauen die KI-Fähigkeiten unserer wichtigsten Lösungen aus — teils durch eigene Entwicklung, teils in Partnerschaft mit Branchenführern, mit Schwerpunkt auf handlungsfähigen Agenten und der Entwicklung ausgewählter Anwendungsfälle gemeinsam mit Kunden.
„Our systems use a combination of advanced authentication procedures, predictive analytics, AI modeling and proprietary and shared databases to assess and detect fraud risk for deposit, card and other transactions for financial institutions."
Unsere Systeme kombinieren fortgeschrittene Authentifizierungsverfahren, vorausschauende Analytik, KI-Modellierung sowie eigene und geteilte Datenbanken, um für Finanzinstitute das Betrugsrisiko bei Einlagen-, Karten- und anderen Transaktionen einzuschätzen und aufzudecken.
Filings Reviewed: 10-K 2026-02-24 · 10-Q 2026-05-08 · 8-K 2026-01-12 · 8-K 2026-03-09 · 8-K 2026-03-10 · 8-K 2026-06-18
Rated on July 26, 2026 · How the Rating Is Built
Highlighted are things our editorial team noticed: green = stands out as strong, red = deserves a closer look. No single metric is a verdict on its own — always read it in context.
Quarterly Figures
| Quarter | EPS (Earnings Per Share) | EPS YoY (%) | Sales ($M) | Sales YoY (%) | Net Margin (%) | OCF ($M) | FCF ($M) |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 2024: Q4 | 0.52 | 23.00 | 2,599 | 3.50 | 10.80 | -9 | -27 |
| 2025: Q1 | 0.15 | -88.20 | 2,532 | 2.60 | 3.00 | 760 | 723 |
| 2025: Q2 | -0.90 | -309.50 | 2,616 | 5.10 | -18.00 | 353 | 314 |
| 2025: Q3 | 0.50 | 23.00 | 2,935 | 14.20 | 9.00 | 1,052 | 993 |
| 2025: Q4 | 0.98 | 89.20 | 2,812 | 8.20 | 18.20 | 798 | 779 |
| 2026: Q1 | 4.58 | 3,055.90 | 3,295 | 30.10 | 71.80 | 745 | 695 |
- EPS (Earnings Per Share):
- Quarterly profit divided by the total share count — how much of the profit works out to a single share.
- YoY (Year over Year):
- Change versus the same quarter a year ago — this is how you compare without seasonal distortion (e.g. the holiday shopping season).
- Sales:
- All revenue for the quarter, before any costs are deducted — the top line of the income statement.
- Net Margin:
- What percentage of sales is left over as profit in the end. Negative means the company is posting a loss.
- OCF (Operating Cash Flow):
- The cash that actually flows into the till from the core business during the quarter — harder to dress up than book profit.
- FCF (Free Cash Flow):
- Operating cash flow minus capital expenditures — the money that's genuinely free to use, say for paying down debt, buybacks, or dividends.
Assessment: Opportunities & Risks
Core banking systems are sold for years and rarely replaced. It shows in the margins: an adjusted EBITDA margin of 43.7 percent in Banking Solutions in the first quarter of 2026 (prior-year quarter 40.7) and 51.6 percent in Capital Market Solutions (49.9). Excluding the acquisition, revenue grew 7 percent in the quarter and 9 percent in banking — noticeably more than the roughly 4 percent annual average between 2023 and 2025.
Operating cash flow rose from $2,078 million (2023) to $2,175 million (2024) to $2,608 million (2025). After $989 million of capital spending, $1,619 million was free — against $1,358 million and $1,298 million in the two prior years. In the first quarter of 2026 operating cash flow of $713 million also beat the prior-year figure of $457 million.
Of $2,366 million of net earnings in the first quarter of 2026, $2,214 million comes from the book gain on the Worldpay disposal. The company's own pro forma table in the 10-Q filed May 8, 2026 puts the same quarter at $187 million. Prior years are barely more useful as a yardstick: minus $6,655 million (2023), plus $1,450 million (2024), plus $382 million (2025) — each heavily shaped by Worldpay effects.
Debt rose between December 31, 2025 and March 31, 2026 from $13.1 billion to $21.1 billion, and the average rate from 3.0 to 3.7 percent. Quarterly net interest expense grew from $80 million to $197 million. Twenty-three percent of the debt floats; one percentage point more costs $48 million a year by the company's own calculation — against $13 million a year earlier.
As of March 31, 2026, goodwill ($24,585 million), intangible assets ($4,450 million) and software ($5,220 million) together make up 78.8 percent of total assets of $43,484 million. The equity ratio stands at 36.7 percent and tangible equity is arithmetically negative. The purchase price allocation is provisional and must be final by January 9, 2027 at the latest; the quarter already carried $104 million of software impairments.
Roughly $21.5 billion of market value (516,879,151 shares at a closing price of $41.51 on July 24, 2026) equals about 13 times 2025 free cash flow and about 11 times adjusted EBITDA. The $1.68 annual dividend yields roughly 4.0 percent at a 28.4 percent payout ratio. The buyback, by contrast, is idle: $30 million in the first quarter of 2026 after $537 million in the prior-year quarter, with $1.8 billion of authorization untouched.
FIS sells software that banks cannot easily walk away from — which is where 43 to 52 percent adjusted segment margins and roughly $1.6 billion of free cash flow in 2025 come from. On January 9, 2026 the company traded its Worldpay stake for the Issuer Solutions business and paid $7.7 billion in cash on top. The resulting $2.2 billion book gain makes the first quarter of 2026 look like the best in company history, while the company's own comparison table shows $187 million. What remains open is whether $13.5 billion was a fair price for a business that earned $35 million before taxes in its first eleven weeks — with debt up to $21.1 billion and the buyback standing still. Not investment advice.
- FIS reached the research list through our in-house stock scanner "Turnaround-Kandidaten": rank 29 of 60 U.S. hits, turn check 6 of 8, as of July 26, 2026 (counted on the live page). These lists are recalculated daily — rank and score are a dated snapshot, not a permanent state. Six of eight is also the display floor.
- The scanner's two mandatory pillars: at least 50 percent below the all-time high, and an Altman Z-score of at least 1.1. FIS clears both with room to spare — the gap to the highest closing price of $157.44 (Feb 14, 2020) is 73.6 percent, and 69.5 percent against the adjusted high of $135.98 (Apr 29, 2021), both measured against $41.51 on July 24, 2026; the Altman Z reads 2.4. Only above roughly $68 (adjusted) or $79 (unadjusted) does pillar 1 break and the stock leaves the list, with nothing having changed in the business.
- Plausibility check on the stored all-time-high gap: roughly 60 stocks in the data set carry an all-time high shifted by a factor of 1,000 through a legacy vendor defect; such values land near minus 99.9 percent and are cut out by the minus 95 percent floor. That does not apply to FIS: our own recalculation from the price history gives minus 69.5 to minus 73.6 percent, squarely inside the permitted window.
- Takeover check: there is no tender offer, no take-private and no merger agreement pending on FIS. The swap with Global Payments (agreements dated April 17, 2025) closed on January 9, 2026 and is therefore complete. Between the most recent quarterly report of May 8, 2026 and the data date of July 26, 2026, the SEC record contains only annual meeting results (8-K of June 12, 2026), a chief legal officer transition (8-K of June 18, 2026) and insider filings.
- Risk of confusion: Fidelity National Information Services, Inc. (FIS, CIK 1136893) is not the same company as Fidelity National Financial, Inc. (FNF, CIK 1331875), a title insurer. Former names of the same CIK per SEC records: Certegy Inc. (until February 1, 2006) and Equifax PS Inc. (2001).
- Price figures are dated valuation anchors, not buy arguments: closing price $41.51 on July 24, 2026, 52-week high $81.94 (July 25, 2025), 52-week low $37.72 (June 22, 2026). Market capitalization cross-check: 516,879,151 shares × $41.51 equals $21.46 billion — identical to the fundamental data figure. The most recent periodic filing is the 10-Q for the quarter ended March 31, 2026.
About the Company
Fidelity National Information Services, Inc. bietet weltweit Lösungen für Finanzinstitute, Unternehmen und Entwickler an.
| CEO Insider Trades (12 Mo.) | buying own stock |
|---|---|
| Employees | 44,000 |
| Headquarters | Jacksonville, FL |
| Website | fisglobal.com |
| IPO Date | 20. Jun 2001 |
| Next Earnings | 4. Aug 2026 |
Management
| Name | Title | Birth Year |
|---|---|---|
| Stephanie L. Ferris | CEO, President & Director | 1974 |
| James Kehoe | Corporate Executive VP & CFO | 1962 |
| Caroline Tsai | Corporate Executive VP and Chief Legal & Corporate Affairs Officer | 1970 |
| Robert Alexander Toohey | Corporate Executive VP & Chief People Officer | 1968 |
| Alexandra Dawn Brooks | Executive VP & Chief Accounting Officer | 1971 |
| Georgios Mihalos | SVP & Head of Investor Relations | – |
| Ellyn Raftery | Executive VP and Chief Marketing & Communications Officer | – |
| Kim Snider | Senior Vice President of Global Marketing & Communications | – |
| Guy M. Hains | Head of Market Team | 1952 |
| Peter Francis | Global Head of Professional Services - Insurance | – |
Executives per the latest required filings; titles kept in their original language. Source: fundamental data.
Insider Transactions
| Date | Person | Role | Type | Shares | Price | Value |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 15. Jul 2026 | Goldstein Jeffrey A | Director | Buy | 1,386 | 41.39 | 57,367 |
Reportable transactions by officers and major shareholders from SEC Form 4 filings. "Other" includes things like stock grants and option exercises without a buy/sell character.
View all insider transactions →Chart
Interactive price chart (TradingView).
Data as of: July 31, 2026 · Source: fundamental data & SEC filings (annual and quarterly reports, 10-K/10-Q)
Note: pure fact-based analysis, not investment advice and not a solicitation to buy or sell. All figures without guarantee.