ARDAGH METAL PACKAGING S.A. (AMBP): what the price assumes

In the published model solve dated 2026-Q2, anchored at $5.10, ARDAGH METAL PACKAGING S.A. (AMBP) is priced for +12.4% growth. boothcheck publishes no house fair value, target price, or buy/sell rating; individual model outputs and user-controlled scenarios are analytical inputs, not Boothcheck targets. Narrative composed 2026-07-25.

Generated: 2026-08-10 · Exported: 2026-08-12 · Source: https://boothcheck.com/report/AMBP

Headline

What The Price Assumes (Inversion)

The assumption today's price embeds, recovered by inverting the valuation.

The operating-margin figure is value-band context at year 12: derived from the framework's value band, a separate calculation — not part of the priced-in solve.

Solve inputs: computed at a 7% cost of capital with 4% terminal growth over a 5-year stage; each 1pp of cost of capital moves the implied operating-profit growth ~9.5pp (computed at the 7% minimum rate; the CAPM rate 6.1% sits below it).

Reconcile: at the x-ray's 9.3% required return this reads ~6.6 years; the models below use their own rates.

How unusual the bet is: within-range

Valuation X-Ray

Asset, earnings-power and peer-multiple models all land far below the price; ONLY the growth-DCF reaches it. The bet is durable compounding the static frames structurally cannot price (a moat/durability premium).

How the valuation models price the stock relative to the market price. Price/FV above 1.0 means the market pays more than that lens defends (expensive); at or below 1.0 the lens can defend the price.

Families that justify the price: Growth Families that call it expensive: Earnings, Relative

The models below discount at their own flat-beta convention rates (cost of equity 9.3%, WACC 6.1%); the inversion above states its own rate.

Per-Model Detail (n=4)

Solvency

Interest expense is not separately reported in the latest filings, so interest coverage cannot be computed.

Bullet Takeaways

• Ardagh makes beverage cans against a contracted book rather than into a spot market, and the 20-F puts it precisely: "Over 80% of our revenue for the year ended December 31, 2025 is backed by multi-year supply agreements ranging from two to seven years in duration", with North America the largest region at 49% of revenue, Europe at 41% and the rest of the world at 9%.
• Financing is the constraint that decides everything else: the 20-F borrowings note shows total borrowings of $3,933 million against cash, cash equivalents and restricted cash of $610 million, carried by a business running an operating margin of about 4.2%.
• Management raised full-year 2026 adjusted profit guidance after the June quarter and held the quarterly dividend at $0.10 a share, while can shipments slipped 1% against a strong prior-year comparison.

Bull Case

Stage matters more than usual here. Ardagh is a mature, capital-intensive manufacturer that has recently come out the far side of a large plant-building program, and that is the specific point in a factory business's life when the reported profit line looks worst: the depreciation from the new capacity is at full weight while the volume that capacity was built for is only arriving. Reported operating margin runs about 4.2%. Read as a steady-state, that number describes a marginal business. Read as a position in a cycle, it describes a business whose costs were incurred earlier than its revenue.

What sits under it is a contracted order book rather than a bid market. The filing states that "Over 80% of our revenue for the year ended December 31, 2025 is backed by multi-year supply agreements ranging from two to seven years in duration, with the remainder largely pursuant to annual arrangements." The commodity risk inside those agreements is passed along rather than absorbed: the company describes "entering into variable-priced pass through contracts with" its customers as one of the ways it manages metal exposure, and buys from a named set of suppliers including Constellium, Aluminium Dynamics and Kaiser Aluminum. A can maker that neither speculates on aluminium nor bids for volume quarter by quarter is a steadier animal than the margin suggests.

Demand has been going the right way across the regions that matter. The 20-F describes the group having "delivered sustained multi-year growth in Europe and North America, while Brazil remained a robust market despite a slight recent moderation in demand", and attributes the longer arc to new beverage product innovation and rising consumer awareness of sustainability. North America is the largest of the three at 49% of revenue, Europe next at 41%, so this is principally a North Atlantic demand read with a Brazilian tail.

Then there is the piece of work that made the equity investable again. During 2025 the group issued €570 million of 5.000% senior secured green notes due 2031 and $620 million of 6.250% senior secured green notes due 2031, using the proceeds to redeem the $600 million 6.000% notes due 2027, repay the senior secured term loan and redeem the preferred shares. That moved the nearest large maturity from just over a year away to the back half of the decade. For a leveraged manufacturer, pushing the wall out is not a financial flourish; it is what converts a refinancing question into an operating one, and it is why a dividend can keep running at all.

Bear Case

The awkward thing about selling cans to the world's largest brewers is that the brewers can make cans. The filing says so directly, noting that certain customers "meet some of their metal beverage packaging requirements through self-manufacturing, which reduces their external purchases of packaging" and naming AB InBev, which "manufactures metal beverage packaging through its affiliate". That is not a distant competitive threat. It is an existing capability inside the customer base, and it sets a ceiling on what any can maker can charge before the customer builds another line of its own.

The buyer side has also been getting more concentrated. The 20-F walks through a decade of drinks-industry consolidation and draws the conclusion itself: such activity "resulted in an increase in the concentration of our sales with our largest customers and if similar consolidations should occur in the future, it could potentially be accompanied by pressure for lower prices." And the contracted book, the strongest fact in the bull case, is finite by construction. The same filing notes those arrangements "expire in accordance with their respective terms and may be terminated under certain circumstances". An eighty-percent-contracted revenue base is a snapshot of coverage, not a structural barrier; every year some portion of it is back on the table opposite a larger buyer.

Now set that against what the price requires. At roughly 34 times operating profit, today's price is consistent with company-wide operating profit growing about 14.1% a year over five years. The rate itself is not extraordinary, and roughly 46% of comparable fast growers held a pace like that across five years, so this is not a bear case about an impossible number. It is a bear case about the base the number sits on. With an operating margin near 4.2%, the difference between hitting and missing that growth path is a couple of percentage points of pricing or utilization, which is precisely the variable a consolidating customer with its own can lines gets to influence.

Financing amplifies whatever happens. The borrowings note shows total borrowings of $3,933 million against cash, cash equivalents and restricted cash of $610 million, carried on a thin operating result, which means the equity is the residual claim on a leveraged operating swing rather than a diversified one. Share count has grown about 2.6% a year across the four years to December 2025, so the dividend the bull case leans on is being paid by a company whose ownership base is expanding rather than contracting. And the near-term operating signal is not accelerating: can shipments fell 1% year over year in the June quarter, and management's own full-year guidance assumes some reversal of favourable first-half timing effects along with inflationary pressure from the conflict in the Middle East. None of that threatens the company. All of it moves the equity.

Valuation

Start with how thin the profit line is relative to what the market is capitalizing. At $4.78 the shares trade at roughly 34 times operating profit, and inverted, that price is consistent with company-wide operating profit growing about 14.1% a year over five years. Measured against Ardagh's own record, the near-term pace is inside what it has recently delivered; the stretch lies in sustaining it. And because the operating margin is only about 4.2%, that growth requirement is not really about winning new business. It is about a couple of points of price and utilization on volume the company already has.

One honest caveat belongs with that figure. It is computed on a cost of capital held at a floor, because the rate the standard approach produces for a business like this one sits below that floor, and the requirement moves violently with the input: a single percentage point on the cost of capital shifts the implied growth requirement by close to ten points. The 14.1% should be read as the centre of a wide band rather than a measured quantity.

The methods split into two camps here, and the split is the information. The approaches that work from cash flows and from the dividend land above today's price. The approaches that work from reported earnings and from peer earnings multiples land far below it. That is not a contradiction so much as a description of the company: after depreciation on recently built plants and the cost of servicing the borrowings, the reported profit residue is small, so any method anchored on that residue cannot reach an enterprise of this size, while methods anchored on the cash the plants generate can. Which of those two is the better picture of what an owner receives is the whole question, and the report does not settle it. What it does say is that nothing about this price rests on the earnings line as reported.

The filing-sourced inputs behind that are clean and worth naming. Revenue is regionally split with North America largest at 49%, Europe at 41% and the rest of the world at 9%. Over 80% of 2025 revenue sat under multi-year supply agreements of two to seven years. Metal cost is passed through under variable-priced contracts rather than carried. In the June 2026 quarter, revenue was $1,713 million, up 18% and 16% at constant currency.

The financing picture bounds the downside and defines the upside in the same breath. The 20-F borrowings note shows total borrowings of $3,933 million against cash, cash equivalents and restricted cash of $610 million, with the 2025 refinancing pushing the principal maturities out to 2031. The company is not consuming cash, and the July declaration left the quarterly dividend unchanged at ten cents a share. Share count has risen about 2.6% a year over the four years to December 2025. For an equity sitting behind that much borrowing on that thin an operating result, the sensitivity runs in both directions: a point of margin recovery is worth a great deal to the residual claim, and a point of margin loss is worth just as much against it.

Catalysts

The June quarter, reported in late July, was the strongest recent evidence for the operating case. Revenue reached $1,713 million, up 18% on the year and 16% at constant currency, and adjusted earnings before interest, tax, depreciation and amortization, the company's own headline measure, came in at $240 million, up 14% and ahead of management's own guidance. The wrinkle inside a good quarter is volume: beverage can shipments fell 1% against the prior-year period, which the company attributed to cycling strong prior-year growth. Revenue up sharply while units are flat to lower is a pricing and mix result, and pricing results are the ones that need watching in a contracted business.

Guidance moved up, with a caveat attached that is unusually specific. Management raised full-year 2026 adjusted earnings before interest, tax, depreciation and amortization guidance to a range of $775 million to $790 million, while stating that the guidance assumes some reversal in the second half of favourable first-half timing factors, naming the pricing impact of metal timing and first-quarter revaluation gains on freight cost hedging, as well as inflationary headwinds arising from the conflict in the Middle East. A company telling you which parts of its own beat were timing is doing the reader a favour; the second-half prints are where that reversal either shows up or does not.

Capital returns held steady rather than expanding. The quarterly dividend per ordinary share stayed at $0.10. That combination, raised profit guidance and an unchanged payout, is consistent with a management team directing incremental cash toward the balance sheet after the 2025 refinancing rather than toward the distribution. For an equity whose entire thesis rests on what is left after the borrowings are served, that allocation choice is the one to track over the next several quarters.

Peer Cohorts (Per Segment, With Filing Citations)

Core business (reported)

• BC (Brunswick Corporation)
• FY2025 10-K: …us in all product groups. In each product area, competitors range in size from large, highly-diversified companies to small, single-product businesses. We also indirectly compete with businesses that offer alternative leisure products or activities. The following summarizes our competitive position in each segment:…
• FY2025 10-K: …product development, or obtain adequate intellectual property protection for new products. Competitors may adopt new technologies and technological advancements, such as using artificial intelligence and machine learning to pursue new products, services, and approaches more quickly, successfully and effectively. To…
• ZBRA (ZEBRA TECHNOLOGIES CORPORATION)
• FY2025 10-K: …eco-packaging and sustainable product design. Additionally, we have science-based targets for carbon emission reductions in Zebra's operations and throughout our value chain. 8 Table of Contents Competition We operate in a highly competitive environment. The need for companies to improve productivity and implement…
• FY2025 10-K: …our global network of partners. Our Competitive Strengths The following are core competitive strengths that we believe enable us to differentiate ourselves from our competitors: An industry leader focused on digitizing and automating operations, and improving enterprise workflows on the frontline We are focused on…
• BLD (TopBuild Corp)
• FY2025 10-K: , which generally drive increased demand for our offerings. ​ 19 ​ Table of Contents Risks Relating to the Industries in Which We Operate ​ Our business relies on residential new construction, commercial construction, and industrial manufacturing activity, and to a lesser extent on residential and commercial…
• FY2025 10-K: …condition, results of operations and cash flows. ​ The specialty distribution and installation market for building products and materials is highly fragmented and intensely competitive, with relatively low barriers to entry. Our Installation Services segment competes with national, regional, and local contractors,…
• SNA (Snap-on Inc)
• FY2025 10-K: 2024, respectively. Operating earnings of $1,327.7 million in 2025 compared to $1,345.7 million in 2024. As a percentage of revenues (net sales plus financial services revenue), operating earnings were 25.8% compared to 26.3% last year. 2025 ANNUAL REPORT 29 Management's Discussion and Analysis of Financial Condition…
• FY2025 10-K: …(gross profit as a percentage of net sales) decreased 20 basis points (100 basis points ("bps") equals 1.0 percent) from 2024 reflecting 20 bps of unfavorable foreign currency effects. The impact of tariffs in 2025 was largely offset by benefits from the company's RCI initiatives. Operating expenses of $1,339.5…
• LII (LENNOX INTERNATIONAL INC)
• FY2025 10-K: …decision to explore strategic alternatives for our European commercial HVAC and refrigeration businesses. We continue to invest in our Heatcraft Worldwide Refrigeration business which is included in the Building Climate Solutions segment. The consolidation of our Heatcraft business within the Building Climate…
• FY2025 10-K: …to establish and maintain intellectual property rights in the products we sell. Our intellectual property rights could be challenged, invalidated, infringed, circumvented, or be insufficient to permit us to take advantage of current market trends or to otherwise provide competitive advantages. Further, the laws of…
• RRX (REGAL REXNORD CORP)
• FY2025 10-K: …have an adverse effect on our business, results of operations and financial condition. In certain markets, customers exercise significant power over business terms. There is substantial and continuing pressure on major OEMs and larger distributors to reduce costs, including the cost of products purchased from outside…
• FY2025 10-K: …based on the segment's income from operations. The Company also regularly provides to the CODM information on adjusted cost of sales and adjusted engineering, selling and administration expenses, which are significant expenses. The following sets forth certain financial information attributable to the Company's…
• CLH (CLEAN HARBORS, INC)
• FY2025 10-K: …factors in this service industry. With regard to commercial hazardous waste incineration services, we 11 Table Of Contents operate the largest network of such facilities in North America. For our industrial, field, emergency response and Safety-Kleen branches' core services, competitors vary by locality and by type…
• FY2025 10-K: …impacted by the demand for planned and unplanned industrial related cleaning, maintenance and specialty services at customer sites as well as environmental cleanup services on a scheduled or emergency basis, including response to large-scale events such as major chemical spills, natural disasters, or other instances…
• GFL (GFL)
• FY2025 40-F: …statement pursuant to Section 12 of the Securities Exchange Act of 1934 ​ or ​ ​ ​ ​ ☒ Annual report pursuant to Section 13(a) or 15(d) of the Securities Exchange Act of 1934 ​ For the fiscal year ended December 31 , 2025 Commission File Number 001-39240 ​ GFL Environmental Inc. (Exact name of Registrant as specified…
• FY2025 40-F: …the Company's Audit Committee and confirming the independence of the Audit Committee, contained in the Annual Information Form, is incorporated by reference herein. SUMMARY OF SIGNIFICANT CORPORATE GOVERNANCE DIFFERENCES We are a "foreign private issuer" (as such term is defined in Rule 3b-4 under the Securities…

Methodology Note

• Priced-in inversion: the valuation is inverted on the current price to recover the operating-income growth, duration, and steady-state margin the price embeds (ROE for financials, FFO growth for REITs).
• Valuation x-ray: the valuation models, grouped into four families (asset, earnings, relative, growth). Each model is expressed as a price/FV ratio (distance from price), not a point fair-value estimate. The spread across families is the disagreement.
• Solvency: net cash/debt, net-debt-to-NOPAT, interest coverage, and share-count CAGR from EDGAR financials (net debt / FFO and fixed-charge coverage for REITs; regulatory-capital framing for financials).
• Peer cohorts: per-segment comparables with deep-linkable SEC filing citations.

Fundamentals sourced from SEC EDGAR filings. Current price from Databento. The priced-in inversion and valuation x-ray are computed by the boothcheck engine; narrative composed by AI from the structured data.