FASTENAL CO
At today's price, FASTENAL CO (FAST) is priced for +27.8% growth. boothcheck doesn't publish a fair value or a price target; it shows what the price assumes, so you can judge whether that bar is too high. Built from SEC EDGAR filings.
• Fastenal sells nuts, bolts, and industrial supplies, but its real product is embedded inventory: vending machines and smart bins installed inside customers' plants that reorder automatically, and those managed-inventory channels now run close to half of sales, which is what makes the business sticky. • The earnings trajectory is strong: Q1 2026 net sales rose 12.4% daily to $2.20 billion, operating margin widened to 20.3%, EPS rose 13.6% to $0.30, and operating cash flow jumped 44.3% to 111.4%
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1,376 institutional managers reported holding FAST in 13F filings for the quarter ended 2026-03-31. Together they hold about 82% of the company; the top 10 hold 43%. 128 opened new positions that quarter. Held by Vanguard Group, BlackRock, State Street, among others. On the short side, 31.3M shares were sold short as of the 2026-06-15 count, about 3% of shares outstanding (4.8 days of typical volume to cover).
Quarterly 13F filings arrive up to 45 days after quarter end, so the picture is never current (filed through 2026-05-29). Nothing here is investment advice.
FAST's share count is about flat over the past five years ($258.10M of repurchases, offset by issuance). It pays a dividend, and has paid one every year in our records (18 and counting); the current rate is $0.88 a share annually. Cash returned over the past three years: $2.79B in dividends and $20.30M in repurchases.
Share counts are split-adjusted; repurchase totals are gross of share issuance. Nothing here is investment advice.
Open-market insider buys at FAST over the trailing three years: 2023: 1 buy totaling $29k; 2024: 3 buys totaling $292k; 2025: 7 buys totaling $214k. 21 officers and directors are on file.
Code P open-market purchases from SEC Form 4 filings, non-derivative, excluding scheduled 10b5-1 plans. Nothing here is investment advice.
FAST's recent reports: the day-one move, then what the following quarter actually did.
| report | day one | next quarter |
|---|---|---|
| 2023-07-19 | -2.1% | -5.2% |
| 2023-10-18 | +7.4% | +10.0% |
| 2024-02-07 | +9.4% | +7.6% |
| 2024-04-17 | -5.7% | -5.1% |
Day-one is the close-to-close move around the filing. Nothing here is investment advice.
FAST's latest 8-K filings: 2026-07-14 (items 2.02, 9.01); 2026-06-23 (items 1.01, 2.03, 9.01); 2026-06-12 (items 5.02); 2026-04-29 (items 5.02, 9.01); 2026-04-24 (items 5.07, 9.01).
Item codes are the SEC's own classification of what each report discloses. Nothing here is investment advice.
Last analyzed: July 3, 2026
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For informational and research purposes only. Not investment advice. Not a recommendation to buy, sell, or hold any security. boothcheck is not a registered investment adviser. Past performance does not guarantee future results.