Copart, Inc. (CPRT) - Company Research

Last Updated: 2 May 2026

Copart, Inc. (NASDAQ: CPRT) operates the world’s largest online vehicle remarketing auction platform — the proprietary Virtual Bidding Third Generation ("VB3") system — connecting insurance companies, banks, charities, fleet operators and dealers with a global pool of registered buyers across 250+ yards in 11 countries. Fiscal 2025 (52 weeks ended 31 July 2025) revenue was $4.647 bn (+9.7%), net income $1.552 bn (+13.9%) and diluted EPS $1.59. Q2 FY2026 (3 months ended 31 January 2026) saw the first revenue contraction in years — revenue $1.122 bn (−3.6%) and EPS $0.36 (vs $0.40) — with management citing higher used-vehicle ACVs reducing total-loss frequency and a 6.7% drop in unit volumes. The bigger competitive headwind: rival IAA (now part of RB Global) won expansion of Progressive salvage volumes from ~75% to ~90% from January 2026. Copart sits on $5.10 bn of cash, zero long-term debt, and a fresh $1.25 bn unsecured revolver signed 23 January 2026. Buybacks were dramatically stepped up: $898.7 m / 24.26 m shares repurchased post-Q2-quarter (Feb–early March 2026), bringing total Nov 2025–early Mar 2026 buybacks to ~$1.12 bn. CEO Jeff Liaw (sole CEO since 1 April 2024) sold 26,213 shares 15 April 2026 under his pre-set 10b5-1 plan. Q3 FY26 results are expected on or around 28 May 2026. For live pricing see our live charts, upcoming releases on the economic calendar, and discussion on the ChartsView forum.

1. Company Snapshot

Company	Copart, Inc.
Ticker	NASDAQ: CPRT (S&P 500, Nasdaq-100)
Sector / Industry	Industrials / Commercial Services / Online Vehicle Auctions
HQ	Copart Tower, 14185 Dallas Parkway, Dallas, Texas 75254, USA
CEO	Jeffrey "Jeff" Liaw (sole CEO since 1 April 2024; previously Co-CEO from March 2022)
Executive Chairman	A. Jayson "Jay" Adair (since 1 April 2024; CEO 2010–2024; takes $1 salary)
Co-Chairman / Founder	Willis J. Johnson (founded company June 1982 in Vallejo, CA)
Founded / IPO	1982 / IPO 17 March 1994 at $12 per share
Employees	~11,600 (as of 31 July 2025)
Operations	250+ yards across 11 countries; 280+ sites; 10,000+ acres
Fiscal year end	31 July
Share price (1 May 2026)	~$33.07
52-week range	$32.20 — $63.85 (high set 16 May 2025)
Market cap (1 May 2026)	~$32.05 bn
Enterprise value	~$27.04 bn
Shares outstanding	963.31 m (as of 2 March 2026)
FY2025 revenue / net income	$4.647 bn (+9.7%) / $1.552 bn (+13.9%)
FY2025 diluted EPS	$1.59 (+13.6%)
Q2 FY2026 revenue / EPS	$1.122 bn (−3.6%) / $0.36 (vs $0.40)
Cash & restricted cash (31 Jan 2026)	$5.10 bn
Long-term debt	$0 (no outstanding debt)
New revolver (Jan 2026)	$1.25 bn unsecured (Wells Fargo agent), maturity 23 Jan 2031
Dividend	None — no regular cash dividend since 1994 IPO
Recent stock splits	2-for-1 stock dividends paid 3 Nov 2022 and 21 Aug 2023
Website	copart.com / investors.copart.com

2. Bull Case vs Bear Case

Bull Case	Bear Case
Pristine balance sheet: $5.10 bn cash + zero long-term debt + new $1.25 bn undrawn revolver = ~$6.35 bn dry powder for buybacks, land, or M&A; ~36.5% FY25 operating margin; 45.7% FY25 gross margin.	RB Global / IAA recapturing share: Progressive contract expanded to ~90% of salvage volumes for IAA from January 2026 — a direct unit-volume headwind that drove the −3.6% Q2 FY26 revenue decline.
Owned-land moat: 10,000+ acres across 280+ sites built up over 40+ years; new acquisitions in CY25 include 835-acre Hall Family Ranch (Charlotte County FL, $13.3 m, Dec 2024) and 40.3-acre Palm Beach industrial site ($65 m, April 2025).	Used-vehicle ACVs near record highs reduce total-loss frequency: Q1 FY26 saw a 6.7% drop in unit volumes citing this dynamic plus consumers cutting collision coverage to manage premium inflation.
Buyback acceleration: ~$1.12 bn deployed Nov 2025–early Mar 2026 (5.48 m shares H1 FY26 + 24.26 m post-Q2 = ~3.07% of shares retired).	DOJ anti-money-laundering investigation: Copart received an October 2023 DOJ letter regarding potential AML-law violations relating to member onboarding/KYC; cooperating; outcome and possible fines disclosed as unable to predict in latest 10-Q.
International growth offset: international service revenue grew ~18.9% YoY in FY25 vs ~10.4% US growth; Germany top insurer transitioned to consignment model (35% gross margin in region); UK, Spain & US openings in FY25.	Stock down ~45–46% over trailing 12 months: at 52-week low ($32.20) tested late April 2026; market is repricing growth assumptions despite still-strong absolute margins.
Adjacent-vertical optionality: Purple Wave investment (heavy equipment auctions, Oct 2023), CrashedToys (motorcycles/powersports), Title Express digital lienholder workflows, One Inc / ClaimsPay integration (Oct 2025).	Owned-yard environmental liability: holding wrecked vehicles with fluids/airbags/batteries on 10,000+ acres exposes Copart to long-tail soil/water contamination remediation costs.
Insider alignment: founder Willis Johnson directly owns ~7.7%; Executive Chairman Adair takes $1 salary & refused other comp since June 2020; CEO Liaw retains a meaningful equity stake post-15 Apr 2026 sale.	Insurer concentration & lumpiness: top 10 insurance carriers represent the bulk of salvage volumes; loss or restructure of a single major contract (as with Progressive's IAA shift) materially affects revenue mix.

3. What Does This Company Actually Do?

Copart runs a two-sided online auction marketplace that monetises the disposal of damaged, total-loss, end-of-life and surplus vehicles. The dominant input flow comes from US property & casualty insurance carriers settling total-loss claims; the dominant output flow goes to dismantlers, rebuilders, used-vehicle dealers, exporters and end-consumers via Copart Direct. Copart's proprietary VB3 platform is mobile- and tablet-friendly, runs in >30 languages, and is the auction infrastructure on which all transactions clear.

Q2 FY2026 revenue mix (3 months ended 31 January 2026, total $1.122 bn):

• US Service Revenue — $819.5 m (~73.0%) — auction fees, processing, storage, towing, title services for US sellers.
• International Service Revenue — $132.6 m (~11.8%) — UK, Germany, Spain, Brazil, Canada, Ireland, Finland, UAE, Bahrain, Oman.
• Vehicle Sales (US + International) — $169.6 m (~15.1%) — gross-revenue sales where Copart takes title (declining as European insurers shift to consignment).

For FY2025, the United States accounted for ~87% of consolidated revenue, with international markets contributing ~13% — the international slice grew ~18.9% YoY versus the ~10.4% US growth rate. The fastest-growing region is the UK; the largest cyclical swing factor is Germany, where the largest insurer customer transitioned to a consignment model and gross margin reached 35% in the segment.

4. The Business Model

Copart's revenue is overwhelmingly fee-based. On the seller side it earns consignment commissions, listing fees and storage charges per vehicle per day. On the buyer side it earns registration fees, transaction fees, gate fees, environmental fees, and internet bidding fees. Vehicle Sales (~15% of Q2 FY26 revenue) is the small minority of transactions where Copart purchases a vehicle outright and re-sells it on its platform — a category the company is actively shrinking in Europe by converting insurer customers to consignment, lifting reported gross margin.

Margins: FY25 operating income was $1.697 bn on $4.647 bn revenue (~36.5% operating margin), with FY25 gross margin ~45.7%. Q2 FY26 operating margin was 34.6% and gross margin 43.9% — the modest compression reflects the unit-volume slip and operating de-leverage of running an asset-heavy yard footprint at lower throughput.

Land moat: Copart's 10,000+ acres of yard real estate (heavily owned, not leased) is a structural barrier to entry — new operators cannot rapidly acquire industrial-zoned land near population centres at the scale required. Permitting timelines for salvage yards routinely run multiple years.

Adjacent businesses: Title Express (digital title procurement and lienholder payoff — integrated with One Inc's ClaimsPay since October 2025), CrashedToys (motorcycles & powersports salvage), Copart Dealer Services (wholesale used-vehicle channel), and the strategic minority investment in Purple Wave (heavy equipment / agricultural auctions, announced October 2023).

Subsidy / regulatory credit dependency: Copart has no material reliance on government incentives, tax credits or regulatory credits. Revenue is fee-based and tied to insurer total-loss flows.

5. Financial Health

Five-year fiscal trend (years ended 31 July, $ millions unless noted):

Metric	FY2021	FY2022	FY2023	FY2024	FY2025
Revenue	2,693	3,501	3,870	4,237	4,647
Operating income	1,136	1,375	1,487	1,572	1,697
Net income	936.5	1,090	1,238	1,363	1,552
Free cash flow	527.9	839.2	847.6	961.6	1,231
Diluted shares (m)	961	965	967	975	978
Capex	n/d	n/d	n/d	~510	569

Last five quarters — revenue and gross margin:

Quarter	Period end	Revenue	Gross profit	Gross margin	Net income	Diluted EPS
Q2 FY25	31 Jan 2025	$1.163 bn	$525.6 m	45.2%	$387.4 m	$0.40
Q3 FY25	30 Apr 2025	$1.20 bn	$552.3 m	46.0%	$406.6 m	$0.42
Q4 FY25	31 Jul 2025	$1.10 bn	$510 m	46.3%	$396 m	$0.41
Q1 FY26	31 Oct 2025	$1.16 bn	$537.0 m	46.3%	$403.7 m	$0.41
Q2 FY26	31 Jan 2026	$1.122 bn	$492.8 m	43.9%	$350.7 m	$0.36

Balance sheet at 31 January 2026: cash & equivalents and restricted cash $5.10 bn (up from $2.78 bn at 31 Jul 2025 as $2.04 bn of held-to-maturity securities matured); long-term debt $0; total assets $10.59 bn; total stockholders' equity $9.79 bn. H1 FY26 operating cash flow $662.8 m; H1 FY26 capex $177.7 m. Share repurchases $218.2 m (5.48 m shares) in H1 FY26, with an additional $898.7 m / 24.26 m shares disclosed as subsequent-events repurchases (Feb – early March 2026) in the Q2 10-Q. Diluted weighted-average shares for H1 FY26 were 976.1 m; shares outstanding at 2 March 2026 were 963.31 m.

6. Valuation & Market Data

Metric	Value (as of 1–2 May 2026)
Share price	~$33.07
Market cap	$32.05 bn
Enterprise value	$27.04 bn
P/E (trailing)	20.92
P/E (forward)	20.83
Price / Sales	6.95
EV / EBITDA	13.91 (some data feeds 15–17 depending on TTM cut)
Price / FCF	22.75
52-week high / low	$63.85 (16 May 2025) / $32.20 (late April 2026)
50-day moving avg	$34.31
200-day moving avg	$40.83
1-year price change	−45.49%
Short interest	30.36 m shares (3.15% of float)
Days to cover	3.87
Beta (5Y)	1.14
Dividend yield	n/a (no dividend)

7. What Are They Building / What's Coming?

• Capacity (yards & land): FY25 capex $569 m (vs $510 m FY24). H1 FY26 capex $177.7 m, annualising ~$355 m. Growth-led, not maintenance — CY25 land deals included 835-acre Hall Family Ranch (Charlotte County, FL, $13.3 m, Dec 2024) and a 40.3-acre Palm Beach industrial site ($65 m, April 2025).
• Capital flexibility: $1.25 bn unsecured revolver signed 23 January 2026 with Wells Fargo as administrative agent, maturity 23 January 2031, with a $500 m discretionary incremental and FX sub-facilities for UK ($250 m-equiv GBP), Germany ($150 m-equiv EUR), Spain ($150 m-equiv EUR) and Canada (CAD). Replaces the prior BofA facility.
• International expansion: new yards opened in UK, Spain and US in FY25; Germany top insurer fully transitioned to consignment model.
• Technology stack: proprietary VB3 (Virtual Bidding Third Generation) is Copart's auction engine; AI-driven Title Express digitalisation; image-processing for damage valuation; consignment-platform tooling for European insurance customers.
• Partnerships: One Inc / ClaimsPay integration with Title Express & Loan Payoff (October 2025) accelerates lienholder payments on total-loss claims.
• Adjacent verticals: Purple Wave (heavy equipment auctions, strategic minority investment, October 2023); CrashedToys (motorcycles/powersports); Copart Dealer Services (whole-car wholesale).
• R&D: not separately disclosed — technology spend is embedded within operating expenses; Copart operates the proprietary VB3 platform in >30 languages.

8. Competitive Landscape

The North American salvage auction market is a duopoly with Copart and IAA controlling the bulk of insurer-driven volumes. The whole-car wholesale market (a smaller part of Copart's mix) is dominated by Manheim and ADESA.

Competitor	Parent	Approx. salvage market share	Notes
Copart	Public (CPRT)	~50%	Market leader; debt-free; owned-land model
IAA (Insurance Auto Auctions)	RB Global (NYSE: RBA)	~35% (rising)	Acquired by RB Global March 2023 for ~$7 bn; won expanded Progressive contract from Jan 2026
Smaller / regional operators	Various	~15% combined	Hundreds of local players; sub-scale
Manheim (whole-car wholesale)	Cox Automotive (private)	n/a (different segment)	Largest US wholesale used-vehicle auction operator
ADESA (whole-car wholesale)	Carvana (since May 2022)	n/a (different segment)	Acquired by Carvana for $2.2 bn

The competitive dynamic shifted measurably in 2025–2026: RB Global won expansion of Progressive salvage volumes from approximately 75% to ~90% IAA share, with that volume flowing through from January 2026 — one of the explicit factors cited for Q2 FY26 unit-volume softness at Copart. RB Global's calendar-2025 group revenue was $4.59 bn (+7%).

9. Leadership and Ownership

Key executives and directors:

• Jeffrey Liaw — CEO and director. Joined Copart 2016. Co-CEO from March 2022 alongside Jay Adair; sole CEO from 1 April 2024.
• A. Jayson "Jay" Adair — Executive Chairman since 1 April 2024. CEO 2010–2024. Director since 1992. Takes a $1 salary and has refused other compensation since June 2020.
• Willis J. Johnson — Founder, Co-Chairman and director. Largest individual holder.

Ownership structure (most recent disclosures): institutional ~81.6%, insider ~13.2%, retail ~5.2%. Founder Willis Johnson directly owns ~7.7% of shares outstanding; A. Jayson Adair holds ~3.1%. Top institutional holders include Vanguard Group (latest Schedule 13G filed 29 April 2026 disclosing 66.09 m shares = 6.86%; some aggregate filings cited up to 11%), BlackRock (~6.5%), State Street, Principal Financial and AllianceBernstein.

Recent insider Form 4 transactions:

Date	Insider	Role	Type	Shares	Avg price	Value	Plan
15 Apr 2026	Jeff Liaw	CEO	Option exercise + open-market sale	26,213 sold (49,775 exercised at $6.78 / $8.70)	$33.18	$869,723	10b5-1 (plan adopted 15 Apr 2025)
15 Jan 2026	Jeff Liaw	CEO	Option exercise + sale	25,137 sold	$40.17	~$1.01 m	10b5-1
25 Nov 2025	Director (per Form 4)	Director	Option exercise + sale	100,000	$39.07	~$3.91 m	n/a
15 Jul 2025	Jeff Liaw	CEO	Open-market sale	24,088	n/d	$1,118,419	10b5-1

All Liaw sales are routine pre-planned 10b5-1 dispositions. After the 15 April 2026 sale, Liaw directly owned 79,532 shares.

10. Risks and Challenges

• Direct duopoly competition: RB Global / IAA aggressively recapturing share, including the new Progressive contract expansion (~90% of Progressive salvage units to IAA from January 2026). A direct unit-volume headwind for Copart.
• Used-vehicle ACV / total-loss frequency: Higher actual cash values reduce the rate at which insurers declare a vehicle a total loss; Q1 FY26 saw a 6.7% drop in unit volumes citing this dynamic plus consumers cutting collision coverage to manage premium inflation.
• Insurance industry concentration: Top 10 carriers represent the bulk of US salvage volumes; loss or restructure of a single major contract (as with the Progressive shift) materially affects revenue mix.
• DOJ anti-money-laundering investigation: Copart received an October 2023 DOJ letter regarding potential AML-law violations related to member onboarding/KYC; cooperating; outcome and any potential fines disclosed in the latest 10-Q as unable to be predicted.
• Regulatory: state-by-state title/branding rules; salvage title processing complexity; potential changes affecting cross-border vehicle movement — particularly relevant for Copart's export-buyer base.
• Environmental liability: owned-land model holding wrecked vehicles with fluids, airbags and batteries on 10,000+ acres exposes Copart to long-tail soil/water contamination remediation costs.
• Catastrophic-weather cyclicality: hurricanes, hail and floods drive surge volumes; mild seasons depress comp growth.
• Macro / consumer behaviour: consumer insurance shopping and dropping comp/collision coverage reduces the population of insurer-routed total-loss vehicles.
• Stock-specific: CPRT down ~45–46% over the trailing 12 months as of May 2026; trading near 52-week lows.

11. Recent Developments

• 29 April 2026 — Vanguard Schedule 13G amendment disclosing 66,093,193 CPRT shares (6.86%); separately reported 0.3% Q4 reduction.
• 28 April 2026 — Flossbach Von Storch SE disclosed $76.63 m position (0.20%), reduced 8.9% during Q4.
• 17 April 2026 — Jeff Liaw Form 4: 15 April 2026 sale of 26,213 shares at average $33.18 = $869,723 (10b5-1 plan).
• 2 March 2026 — Q2 FY26 10-Q filed; subsequent-events disclosure of $898.7 m / 24.26 m additional share repurchases post-quarter.
• 19 February 2026 — Q2 FY26 results: revenue $1.122 bn (−3.6%); gross profit $492.8 m (−6.2%); net income $350.7 m (−9.5%); diluted EPS $0.36 vs $0.40.
• 23 January 2026 — Signed $1.25 bn unsecured revolving credit facility with Wells Fargo as administrative agent, maturing 23 January 2031.
• 5 December 2025 — 2025 annual meeting at Copart Tower, Dallas. ~91% of shares represented; all 12 directors elected; Ernst & Young ratified.
• 20 November 2025 — Q1 FY26 results: revenue $1.16 bn (+0.7%); net income $403.7 m (+11.5%); diluted EPS $0.41 (+10.8%); US insurance ASP +8% YoY (all-time high).
• October 2025 — One Inc / ClaimsPay integration with Title Express & Loan Payoff system.
• 26 September 2025 — FY2025 Form 10-K filed.
• 4 September 2025 — FY2025 Q4 + annual results: FY25 revenue $4.65 bn (+9.7%); net income $1.55 bn (+13.9%); diluted EPS $1.59 (+13.6%).

12. Key Dates Coming Up

• ~28 May 2026 — Q3 FY2026 earnings release (3 months ended 30 April 2026).
• Early September 2026 — Q4 + FY2026 earnings release (typical cadence after 31 July fiscal year end).
• ~December 2026 — 2026 Annual Meeting of Stockholders (historically early December at Copart Tower, Dallas).
• No ex-dividend dates — Copart has never paid a regular cash dividend.

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