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Analyzing the stock…
70
Gathering technical, fundamental, and market data — a few seconds
Consumer Discretionary · ·
$174.83
▼ $0.25 (-0.1%)
Market data updated: 09/19 05:35 AM
Fundamentals updated: 09/19/2026
News analyzed: 09/19/2026
Market Cap
$4.91B
Day Range
$172.67 - $177.09
52-Week Range
$154.67 - $247.85
Beta
—
Next Earnings
26.10.2026
Support
$172.67
Resistance
$247.85
VSEC is a stock from the Consumer Cyclical sector — Retail, automotive, and leisure — demand rises and falls with economic sentiment and consumers' disposable income.
+1.3% (1Y)
Strengths: 8/30 factors positiveRisk: Medium
This score and all analysis on this page are for informational and educational purposes only and do not constitute investment advice. Read the full disclaimer
Weighted: Technical 25% · Fundamental 20% · Growth 15% · Valuation 15% · News 10% · Quality 10% · Risk 5%
Overall Score
🔴 Bearish
Technical Trend
🔴 Bearish
Insiders
🔴 Bearish
Computed directly from the same signals behind the score above — not AI-generated.
Biggest positive driver
Revenue growth (last year)
Revenue growth (last year): 41.5%
Growth
Biggest negative driver
DCF Fair Value
Estimated fair value: -$4.01 vs. price $174.83 (-102.3%)
Fair Value
What to watch next
When today echoes the past.
NO RELIABLE ECHO FOUND
Only 3 historical analog(s) found after removing overlapping dates — too few for a statistically meaningful comparison.
Historical matches considered: 3
TIME ECHO identifies historical situations that resemble the current market state. Historical outcomes are not guarantees of future performance. Similarity does not imply causation, and results may change as new data becomes available.
🗓️ What Changed This Week
🌱 Building History
We don't have a real data point from a week ago for this stock yet. The weekly comparison will appear once enough history has accumulated.
📊 Score History
44
Today
—
30D
—
90D
—
1Y
🐂🐻 Investment Thesis
🐂 Bull Case
🐻 Bear Case
🔍 What Could Prove This Wrong
This isn't a price-direction forecast — just a synthesis of real, already-computed data, and future conditions that could change the picture.
🧬 STOCK DNA
This stock's profile across 8 real dimensions — a research tool, not a recommendation
Growth
54
Quality
63
Value
33
Momentum
9
Risk
54
Sentiment
100
Fundamental
49
Institutional
0
Stocks with a similar DNA right now
This stock hasn't been analyzed by StockIQAI's movement engine yet — coverage is still expanding. Check back soon.
Recent media coverage of VSE Corporation has focused on its strong second-quarter results, including a 65% year-over-year revenue increase to $449.1 million and raised full-year guidance. Investors are scrutinizing the company’s aggressive debt-funded aviation acquisitions, such as the $2.03 billion Precision Aviation Group deal and the NorthStar purchase, which have raised concerns about elevated debt levels and negative free cash flow. Despite record earnings, the stock has seen volatility, with a recent 8.9% drop after the report and mixed investor sentiment. Management is also scheduled to attend investor conferences in September 2026.
AI summary based on English-language news sources only — not investment advice.
Everyone's writing about VSE Corporation. News trend score: 100. Reason: 11 of the last 20 articles are positive, versus 0 negative.
News trend analysis is based on article sentiment only, and is not investment advice or financial counsel. Read the full disclaimer
🌡️ Emotional Temperature
33
🎯 Conviction (vs. Emotion)
43
Psychology
75
Fundamentals
49
Technical
9
Valuation
33
The price is holding at a real, documented historical support/resistance level (a 50-day high or low).
A sharp drop, unusual volume, and negative news sentiment all at once — selling pressure that looks emotional.
A significant decline over time, but on unusually low trading volume — holders unwilling to accept the loss.
Price, volume, and sentiment accelerating together — a sign investors are chasing the price, not just following it.
Extreme momentum, price far above its moving average, and a large premium over fair value.
Price (3M)
-20%
Market Narrative
53
Fundamental Reality
43
Narrative Gap
+10
🔀 Psychology Acceleration
News attention/sentiment is running well ahead of the price move itself.
🧠 StockIQ Psychologist
The market behavior suggests a disconnect between euphoric positioning (+3.8% above 200-day average) and weak momentum (-3.6% ROC), indicating potential overvaluation despite neutral RSI (45). The narrative gap (17 points) hints at optimism misaligned with fundamentals. Key question: Will traders sustain euphoria despite negative short-term momentum? The lack of dominant state implies uncertainty, with no clear behavioral bias driving decisions.
Updated: 09/09/2026, 09:34 AM
👥 What the crowd believes
"detailed large aviation acquisitions including the US$2.03 billion Precision Aviation Group deal and the NorthStar purchase"
"Revenue reached $449.1 million, up 65% from the same quarter a year earlier, and management raised full-year guidance"
"higher debt levels and negative free cash flow tied to these transactions"
"share price has eased in recent weeks, with a 7-day return of 5.52% and an 8.9% drop immediately following the earnings release"
📈 11D Investor Psychology
Signal classification confidence: High (confidence in the behavioral read, not a price prediction). Describes observable market behavior, not what any individual investor thinks, and is not a buy/sell signal.
🏛️ Investor DNA — Historical Investors
A Historical Strategy Simulation: assuming each investor follows their documented principles, how would they rate this stock today? This is not a prediction of what they would actually do.
🟢 Best match
Walter Bagehot — 100/100
🔴 Weakest match
Thorstein Veblen — 21/100
🗣️ Why do they disagree?
The stark divide in verdicts for VSEC reflects a clash between defensive, cyclical, and growth-oriented methodologies. At the top, Walter Bagehot and Edgar Lawrence Smith see it as a resilient, long-term hold—Bagehot’s liquidity focus and Smith’s decade-long buy-and-hold philosophy both suggest stability and enduring value. Meanwhile, Fisher and Nelson lean bullish on quality and timing, with Fisher’s high score signaling exceptional fundamentals and Nelson’s cycle analysis pointing to a favorable oversold position. However, the middle tier—from Marks and Lynch to Loeb—cautions that while the business may be sound, the price already embeds much of its upside, leaving room for only moderate returns. The bottom half, dominated by Graham’s strict valuation rules and Veblen’s critique of speculative growth, dismisses it outright, with Graham’s Enterprising Investor variant being the most dismissive. This spectrum mirrors a tension between optimism over fundamentals and skepticism about valuation or market positioning.
Walter Bagehot
Lombard Street (1873)
🟢 100
Strong liquidity — would likely survive a real credit squeeze
Key question
Does this company have enough liquidity to survive real stress?
Fact → Principle → Simulation
Samuel Armstrong Nelson
The ABC of Stock Speculation (1903)
🟢 98
Cycle position looks favorable — closer to oversold than overbought
Key question
Is the price overextended, or is there still room to move?
Fact → Principle → Simulation
Edgar Lawrence Smith
Common Stocks as Long-Term Investments (1924)
🟢 94
Looks like a real 'buy and hold for a decade' candidate
Key question
Is this a stock I'd be happy to hold and forget about for a decade?
Fact → Principle → Simulation
Jack Schwager
Market Wizards (1989)
🟢 77
A real, disciplined setup with favorable reward/risk
Key question
What's the risk/reward here, and where is my exit point?
Fact → Principle → Simulation
Charles Mackay
Extraordinary Popular Delusions and the Madness of Crowds (1841)
🟢 76
No obvious signs of crowd mania
Key question
Am I being swept along with the crowd, or thinking for myself?
Fact → Principle → Simulation
Philip Fisher
Common Stocks and Uncommon Profits (1958)
🟢 75
Exceptional company quality by Fisher's standards
Key question
How exceptional is this business, really?
Fact → Principle → Simulation
Howard Marks (Market Cycle)
Mastering the Market Cycle (2018)
🟢 75
Looks early-to-mid cycle, not overextended
Key question
Where are we in the cycle right now — near a hot extreme, or a cold one?
Fact → Principle → Simulation
Howard Marks
The Most Important Thing (2011) / Mastering the Market Cycle (2018)
🟡 62
Mixed — a good business, but expectations may already be high
Key question
What is the market probably misunderstanding about the risk here?
Fact → Principle → Simulation
Morgan Housel
The Psychology of Money (2020)
🟡 62
Moderate — holdable, but not effortless
Key question
Could I live with this volatility long enough for compounding to actually work?
Fact → Principle → Simulation
Gerald M. Loeb
The Battle for Investment Survival (1935)
🟡 57
Moderate risk to capital
Key question
How much capital could I lose here if I'm wrong?
Fact → Principle → Simulation
Peter Lynch
One Up on Wall Street (1989)
🟡 56
Mixed — growth exists but the price already reflects much of it
Key question
Is the growth worth the price?
Fact → Principle → Simulation
Burton Malkiel & John Bogle
A Random Walk Down Wall Street (1973) / The Little Book of Common Sense Investing (2007)
🟡 48
Mixed case — the evidence for picking this stock over an index is not strong
Key question
Do I actually have an edge here, or do I just think I do?
Fact → Principle → Simulation
Benjamin Graham
Security Analysis (1934) / The Intelligent Investor (1949)
🟡 46
Mixed — doesn't clearly pass Graham's tests
Key question
Where is my margin of safety?
Fact → Principle → Simulation
Benjamin Graham (Enterprising Investor)
The Intelligent Investor (1949) — the Enterprising Investor chapters
🔴 31
Not statistically cheap enough for the Enterprising Investor's looser safety bar
Key question
Is the stock statistically cheap enough to justify the extra risk?
Fact → Principle → Simulation
Jesse Livermore
Reminiscences of a Stock Operator (1923) / How to Trade in Stocks (1940)
🔴 22
Negative trend — against Livermore's core rule of trading with the trend
Key question
What is the price telling me right now?
Fact → Principle → Simulation
Thorstein Veblen
The Theory of Business Enterprise (1904)
🔴 21
Pattern Veblen would flag as growth pursued for its own sake
Key question
Is management building real value, or just building itself?
Fact → Principle → Simulation
Based on the last 282 trading days, calculated from real price data. Click an indicator for details and a chart.
🔴 Most indicators support a downtrend (0 bullish · 11 bearish · 0 neutral)
A market-structure read based purely on real price and volume data — not full classic Wyckoff schematic identification (Phase A-E), but a quantitative analysis of what can reliably be computed: trading ranges, "effort vs. result", volume within the range, and Spring/Upthrust detection.
The stock is in a clear downtrend with no defined trading range in the period examined.
Medium confidence
The Wyckoff Method, developed by Richard Wyckoff in the early 20th century, reads the balance of supply and demand through price and volume, based on the premise that large investors ("smart money") quietly accumulate shares before rallies and quietly distribute them before declines. The read here is based solely on real price and volume data — full, precise identification of classic Wyckoff patterns (such as Phases A-E) requires human chart-reading experience and judgment, so this is an approximate algorithmic read, not a substitute for professional analysis. This should not be considered investment advice.
Gross Margin
—
Operating Margin
8.1%
Net Margin
1.1%
EBITDA Margin
11.6%
ROE
0.8%
ROA
0.6%
ROIC
—
EPS
$0.55
Cash
$69.36M
Total Debt
$292.80M
Current Ratio
3.76
Debt/Equity
0.20
Total dividend per share paid each year, over the last 5 years.
| Ex-Dividend Date | Amount per Share |
|---|---|
| 15.7.2026 | $0.100 |
| 14.7.2026 | $0.100 |
| 15.4.2026 | $0.100 |
| 14.4.2026 | $0.100 |
| 15.1.2026 | $0.100 |
| 14.1.2026 | $0.100 |
| 15.10.2025 | $0.100 |
| 14.10.2025 | $0.100 |
| 16.7.2025 | $0.100 |
| 15.7.2025 | $0.100 |
| 1.5.2025 | $0.100 |
| 30.4.2025 | $0.100 |
How is Fair Value calculated? →
Current Price
$174.83
Estimated Fair Value (DCF)
-$4.01
Model estimate — not a price target. Highly sensitive to growth/discount-rate assumptions.
Gap
-102.3%
🔴 Appears expensive relative to estimated value
Year 1 Growth Rate
22.4%
Discount Rate (WACC)
9.0%
Terminal Growth Rate
2.5%
Projection Years
5
| Year | Growth Rate | Projected FCF | Present Value |
|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | 22.4% | $6.99M | $6.41M |
| 2 | 17.4% | $8.21M | $6.91M |
| 3 | 12.5% | $9.23M | $7.13M |
| 4 | 7.5% | $9.92M | $7.03M |
| 5 | 2.5% | $10.17M | $6.61M |
Base FCF (last actual year)
$5.71M
Terminal Value
$160.35M
Present Value of Terminal Value
$104.22M
Enterprise Value
$138.30M
Net Debt
$223.45M
Equity Value
$-85.14M
*The DCF model is an estimate based on assumptions — not a guaranteed forecast. You can change the assumptions to examine different scenarios.
Book Value per Share
$67.74
Tangible Book Value per Share (Tangible NAV)
$23.62
Sentiment based on basic keywords (not AI) — 11 positive, 9 neutral, 0 negative out of the last 20 articles.
Benzinga · 15.9.2026
Yahoo · 14.9.2026
Simply Wall St. · 5.9.2026
Yahoo · 5.9.2026
Yahoo · 5.9.2026
Simply Wall St. · 5.9.2026
Yahoo · 4.9.2026
Insider Monkey · 4.9.2026
Yahoo · 3.9.2026
StockStory · 3.9.2026
Yahoo · 3.9.2026
Business Wire · 3.9.2026
SeekingAlpha · 2.9.2026
MT Newswires · 31.8.2026
Yahoo · 31.8.2026
Business Wire · 31.8.2026
Benzinga · 31.8.2026
ChartMill · 31.8.2026
Yahoo · 28.8.2026
StockStory · 28.8.2026
VSE Corporation (VSEC) currently has a StockIQ AI score of 44/100, rated "Weak". The score is a weighted average across up to 7 categories (technical, fundamental, growth, fair value, news, quality, risk), based on real data only.
VSEC currently scores 44/100 (Weak) across the categories we measure. StockIQ doesn't give buy/sell recommendations — use this as one data point in your own research, not as investment advice.
Per StockIQ's DCF model, VSEC's estimated fair value is -$4.01, which is 102.3% below the current price of $174.83. This is one valuation model among several signals in the fair-value category, not a price target.
VSEC's technical score is 9/100, which currently reads as bearish — based on real price/volume signals (moving averages, RSI, MACD, and more), not a prediction of what happens next.
Based on the real signals StockIQ computed: Revenue growth (last year): 41.5%; Free cash flow growth: 111.0%; Operating margin is stable or improving over time.
Based on the real signals StockIQ computed: Estimated fair value: -$4.01 vs. price $174.83 (-102.3%); ATR: 5.6% of price; Earnings per share (EPS) growth: -35.3%.
Yes — VSEC has a real recorded dividend payment history on StockIQ. See the Dividends section on this page for the actual per-share amounts and dates.
Real transactions by officers and insiders, as reported to the SEC on Form 4 — 0 purchases and 10 sales out of the last 25 filings.
| Name | Transaction Type | Date | Shares | Change | Price |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| CUOMO JOHN A | Open Market Sale | 17.8.2026 | 2,794 | -2,794 | $244.42 |
| CUOMO JOHN A | Open Market Sale | 17.8.2026 | 1 | -1 | $245.05 |
| CUOMO JOHN A | Open Market Sale | 17.8.2026 | 5,492 | -5,492 | $243.37 |
| CUOMO JOHN A | Open Market Sale | 17.8.2026 | 4,215 | -4,215 | $242.62 |
| CUOMO JOHN A | Open Market Sale | 17.8.2026 | 1,492 | -1,492 | $238.66 |
| CUOMO JOHN A | Open Market Sale | 17.8.2026 | 454 | -454 | $239.40 |
| CUOMO JOHN A | Open Market Sale | 17.8.2026 | 905 | -905 | $240.58 |
| CUOMO JOHN A | Open Market Sale | 17.8.2026 | 2,147 | -2,147 | $241.58 |
| FERGUSON III MARK E | Gift | 11.8.2026 | 350 | -350 | — |
| FERGUSON III MARK E | Gift | 11.8.2026 | 350 | +350 | — |
| FERGUSON III MARK E | Gift | 20.7.2026 | 133 | -133 | — |
| FERGUSON III MARK E | Gift | 20.7.2026 | 133 | +133 | — |
| FERGUSON III MARK E | Gift | 20.7.2026 | 0 | -133 | — |
| FERGUSON III MARK E | Gift | 20.7.2026 | 17,555 | +133 | — |
| Thomas Benjamin E. | Grant/Award from Employer | 30.6.2026 | 69 | +69 | $159.56 |
| Thomas Benjamin E. | Grant/Award from Employer | 30.6.2026 | 42,908 | +69 | $159.56 |
| EBERHART RALPH E | Grant/Award from Employer | 15.6.2026 | 60 | +60 | $198.55 |
| FERGUSON III MARK E | Grant/Award from Employer | 15.6.2026 | 133 | +133 | $198.55 |
| FERGUSON III MARK E | Grant/Award from Employer | 15.6.2026 | 133 | +133 | $198.55 |
| EBERHART RALPH E | Grant/Award from Employer | 15.6.2026 | 47,447 | +60 | $198.55 |
| Thomas Benjamin E. | Open Market Sale | 12.6.2026 | 6,500 | -6,500 | $196.82 |
| Thomas Benjamin E. | Open Market Sale | 12.6.2026 | 42,839 | -6,500 | $196.82 |
| FERGUSON III MARK E | Gift | 20.5.2026 | 136 | +136 | — |
| FERGUSON III MARK E | Gift | 20.5.2026 | 136 | -136 | — |
| FERGUSON III MARK E | Gift | 20.5.2026 | 0 | -136 | — |
Official FINRA data — the number of shares open in short positions, plus daily short-sale activity.
2,072,198 shares short as of 2026-08-31 · vs. 2,206,875 on 2026-07-31
Official biweekly report (FINRA Rule 4560) — no real higher-frequency data exists for this metric.
60.5% of trading volume this week was short selling, vs. 69.8% the prior week
Based on daily short-sale volume (Reg SHO) — a different metric from the open short interest above: this is daily trading volume, not an open position, so it updates weekly rather than biweekly.
Full breakdown of every data type and its source: Data Sources · Methodology