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3M Company

Data period: Annual Quarterly Graham uses annual
NYSE · Industrials
3M Company
MMM · Conglomerates
$160.60
▲ 1.37 (0.86%)
Cached · 10 min
Overall Grade
D
Defensive
C
Enterprising
Profitability
B
Gross Profit Margin 40.7%
Operating Margin 23.3%
Net Income Margin 10.8%
Fin. Health
D
Years to Pay Off Debt 19.2 yrs
Working Capital vs Long-Term Debt -$5.5B
Working Capital $5.4B
Valuation
F
Margin of Safety 0.0%
Price-to-Book 25.67x
Cash Flow
B
Free Cash Flow $349M
CapEx % of Net Income 34.5%
Owner Earnings $1.2B
About 3M Company
3M Company provides diversified technology services in the America, the Asia Pacific, Europe, the Middle East, Africa, and internationally. It operates through three segments: Safety and Industrial, Transportation and Electronics, and Consumer. The Safety and Industrial segment provides industrial abrasives and finishing for metalworking applications; autobody repair solutions; industrial specialty products, such as personal hygiene products, masking, and packaging materials; electrical products and materials for construction and maintenance, power distribution, and electrical original equipment manufacturers; structural adhesives and tapes; respiratory, hearing, eye, and fall protection solutions; and natural and color-coated mineral granules for shingles. The Transportation and Electronics segment provides ceramic solutions; attachment and bonding, films, sound, and temperature management for transportation vehicles; format graphic films for advertising and fleet signage; reflective signage for highway and vehicle safety; light management films and electronics assembly solutions; chip packaging and interconnection solutions; semiconductor production materials; and data center solutions. The Consumer segment offers cleaning products for the home; consumer air quality products; picture hanging accessories; retail abrasives, paint accessories, and safety products; stationery and office products; automotive appearance products; and consumer bandages, tapes, braces, and supports. It serves automotive; commercial solutions; consumer markets; design and construction; electronics; energy; government; manufacturing; safety; transportation industries. The company offers its products through e-commerce and traditional wholesalers, retailers, jobbers, distributors, channel partner, and dealers, as well as directly to users. 3M Company was founded in 1902 and is headquartered in Saint Paul, Minnesota.
Metric Explanations
What each dimension measures and where the thresholds come from.
Gross Profit Margin
Revenue minus cost of goods sold. Graham's ≥40% threshold identifies businesses with durable pricing power. Note: software and financial companies naturally exceed this; retailers and manufacturers rarely reach it due to their cost structures.
Operating Margin
Profit after operating costs before interest and taxes. A consistent ≥15% operating margin signals a business with real competitive advantages. Capital-intensive industries (airlines, auto, commodities) rarely hit this threshold due to their structural cost base — compare within industry for context.
Net Income Margin
Bottom-line profit as a percentage of revenue. The ≥20% target reflects Buffett's preference for highly profitable businesses. Financial engineering (buybacks, tax optimisation) can inflate this temporarily — look for consistency across multiple years rather than a single strong result.
Years to Pay Off Debt
Total Debt ÷ Net Income. Lower = stronger balance sheet. Important caveat: utilities, telecoms, REITs, and infrastructure companies carry large structural debt by design — their bond-like cash flows service it comfortably at ratios that would alarm Graham. Compare within sector.
Working Capital vs Long-Term Debt
Working Capital minus Long-Term Debt. Negative results are common and expected in capital-return-focused businesses like Apple, Domino's, and McDonald's — where aggressive buybacks and dividends intentionally reduce book equity. This does not indicate financial distress in high-FCF businesses.
Working Capital
Current Assets minus Current Liabilities. Negative working capital can be a deliberate efficiency strategy in businesses that collect cash before paying suppliers (retailers, fast food franchises, subscription businesses). Assess alongside free cash flow generation for full context.
Margin of Safety
How far below the Graham Number the stock trades. Graham required a 33% discount as a buffer against analytical error. However, the Graham Number itself assumes 1960s-era P/E and P/B norms — for modern asset-light businesses it often understates true intrinsic value, making 0% MoS appear misleadingly bad.
Price-to-Book
Market price vs book value per share. Rarely below 1.5x for quality businesses today. Intangible assets (brand, software, patents) don't appear on the balance sheet under accounting rules, making P/B artificially high for asset-light companies like software and consumer brands.
Free Cash Flow
Operating cash flow minus capital expenditures. Buffett's most important metric — cash a business actually generates for its owners after maintaining and growing its asset base. Consistently positive FCF is one of the strongest indicators of a durable, well-run business regardless of accounting profits.
CapEx % of Net Income
Capital expenditure as a share of net income. Low CapEx signals a capital-light business that doesn't need heavy reinvestment to sustain earnings — Buffett's ideal. High CapEx is structurally necessary in manufacturing, airlines, telecoms, and semiconductors. For these industries, a high reading reflects the business model, not poor management.
Owner Earnings
Net Income + Depreciation & Amortisation − Capital Expenditures. Buffett's preferred measure of a company's true annual earning power — what could theoretically be distributed to owners without impairing the business. More reliable than reported EPS because it accounts for the capital cost of maintaining the business.
Market Cap $83.8B
Enterprise Value $91.7B
P/E (TTM) 30.94
Dividend Yield 1.87%
Exchange NYSE
Gross Profit 40.7%
Operating Margin 23.3%
Net Margin 10.8%
Sector Industrials
Industry Conglomerates
Employees 60500
Country United States
📖
Full Graham Analysis

Mr. Market is currently offering 3M Company at $160.60.

The business passes only 2 of 7 of Graham's defensive criteria — well below his required standard.

At $160.60, the stock trades at a 1120% premium to its Graham Number of $13.16. Graham would consider this price speculative.

There is no margin of safety at the current price. Graham would advise patience and waiting for a better entry point.

Negative NCAV — liabilities exceed current assets. Common in capital-return businesses (buybacks, debt-funded dividends) and capital-intensive industries. Not automatically a warning sign..

Conclusion: By Graham's standards, this stock is speculative at its current price. The intelligent investor would look elsewhere or wait.

Showing Key Metrics
Income Highlights
Metric Q1 2026 Q4 2025 Q4 2024
Gross Profit % 40.7% 33.6% N/A
Operating Margin % 23.3% 12.9% N/A
Net Income % 10.8% 9.4% N/A
Diluted EPS 1.23 1.07 N/A
Balance Sheet Highlights
Metric Q1 2026 Q4 2025 Q4 2024
Total Assets $35.4B $37.7B N/A
Total Debt $12.6B $12.6B N/A
Working Capital $5.4B $6.8B N/A
Years to Pay Debt 19.23 21.84 N/A
Cash Flow Highlights
Metric Q1 2026 Q4 2025 Q4 2024
Free Cash Flow $349M $1.3B N/A
Owner Earnings $1.2B $1.3B N/A
CapEx % of Net Income 34.5% 43.0% N/A
📊 Quarterly mode — Graham Fair Value & 7 Criteria require annual data. Switch to Annual for full analysis.
Quarter vs Same Quarter Last Year
YoY strips seasonality
Revenue Growth (YoY)
Prior year: $6.0B ▲ $6.0B +1.3%
Revenue growth vs same quarter last year strips seasonality. Consistent double-digit growth is a Buffett hallmark.
Gross Margin
Prior year: 41.6% ▼ 40.7% -0.9pp
Buffett: consistent gross margin above 40% signals durable pricing power and competitive moat.
Operating Margin
Prior year: 23.6% ▲ 23.3% -0.3pp
Graham: operating margin reflects true business economics before financing. Trend matters as much as level.
Net Margin
Prior year: 18.7% ▼ 10.8% -7.9pp
Net margin can be distorted by one-time items, tax timing, or interest costs — compare to operating margin for signal quality.
Quarterly Health Checks
3 Graham/Buffett criteria that are valid and reliable on quarterly data
✅ Adequate Size
Graham required scale for resilience. Quarterly revenue × 4 gives an annualised proxy.
$6.0B/qtr (≈$24.1B ann.)
vs > $1.5B annualised revenue
❌ Financial Condition
Current assets vs current liabilities — a real-time liquidity snapshot. Valid and reliable on quarterly data.
1.59x current ratio
vs ≥ 2.0x
✅ Free Cash Flow
Buffett's most important single metric. A positive FCF quarter means the business generated real cash for owners after maintaining its asset base.
$349M
vs Positive
Operating Cash Flow
$574M
Latest quarter · Buffett's cash reality check
ROIC
4.2%
Based on latest annual operating income
Return on Invested Capital — Buffett's preferred measure for asset-light businesses. ROIC > 15% consistently signals a durable competitive advantage (moat). More meaningful than P/B for software, pharma, and consumer brand companies where most value is intangible and off-balance-sheet.
Market Cap / Net Assets
25.3x
Net Assets: $3.3B
⚠️ Net margin compressed 7.9pp vs same quarter last year. Common causes: one-time charges (restructuring, write-downs, legal settlements), tax rate changes, or rising interest expense. Check the income statement notes before drawing conclusions about operating health.
Peers & Industry
No auto-detected peers for Conglomerates. You can manually compare MMM against any stock using the Compare tool.
"The management of a business is its most important single factor — more important than market position, patents, or financial structure."
— Benjamin Graham
Capital Allocation & Alignment
Insider Ownership
0.10%
Low — management has little skin in the game
Return on Equity (ROE)
20.0%
Excellent — management generates strong returns on equity
Return on Assets (ROA)
1.8%
Poor — assets are not generating adequate returns
Share Buybacks (Latest Year)
$3.3B
Management is returning capital to shareholders via buybacks
Debt Trend YoY
-0.4% YoY
Debt is declining — management is deleveraging
Leadership Team
William Brown
CEO & Chairman
Age 62
Pay: $6,249,915
0.957% of net income
Anurag Maheshwari
CFO & Executive VP
Age 51
Pay: $2,950,434
0.452% of net income
Christian Goralski Jr.
Group President of Safety & Industrial
Age 53
Pay: $2,080,109
0.319% of net income
Wendy Bauer
Group President of Transportation & Electronics Business Group
Age 49
Pay: $1,853,308
0.284% of net income
Chinmay Trivedi
Senior Vice President of Investor Relations and Financial Planning & Analysis
Top Institutional Holders
Institution % Owned Shares
JPMORGAN CHASE & CO 8.90% 46,431,098
Blackrock Inc. 8.18% 42,661,966
Vanguard Capital Management LLC 6.56% 34,227,417
State Street Corporation 5.32% 27,723,744
Geode Capital Management, LLC 2.28% 11,897,247
FMR, LLC 1.82% 9,484,937
Vanguard Portfolio Management LLC 1.81% 9,450,949
Capital World Investors 1.76% 9,172,034
⚠️ Very high debt-to-equity — leverage risk
Risk Analysis
Beta (Market Risk)
1.09
Moderate volatility — moves slightly more than market
Short Interest
1.8% of float
Low short interest — market is not heavily bearish
Debt-to-Equity
3.96x
High leverage — significant financial risk
Current Ratio
1.59x
Adequate liquidity
52-Week Price Range
Low: $139.34 Current: $160.60 High: $177.41
Currently at 56% of 52-week range

3M Company (MMM) fundamental analysis — Overall grade D based on profitability, financial health, valuation and cash flow. Graham's Fair Value: $13.16. Margin of safety: 0%. Gross profit margin: 40.7%. Operating margin: 23.3%. Net margin: 10.8%. Market cap: $83.8B. Sector: Industrials. Industry: Conglomerates. Analysis powered by 360investing — free fundamental stock analysis based on Benjamin Graham and Warren Buffett principles.

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