BF Card
Last updated: 7 April 2026
What is a BF Card?
BF stands for Business Fundamentals. Before you decide whether a price is worth paying, the BF Card tells you what kind of business you are actually looking at. It pulls from the income statement, balance sheet, cash flow statement, and analyst estimates, then scores four pillars: growth, earnings quality, cash conversion, and financial resilience. The model adjusts automatically by company stage, because the right questions for a bank or a pre-profit startup are not the same.
Valuation
Valuation answers one question: is the price fair for what the business is actually worth today? The answer depends on which measuring stick fits the company. Profitable companies are measured differently from pre-profit ones, and financial companies need their own framework.
How the metric is selected
Finance Dupes picks the valuation metric automatically based on what data is available and what model the company falls under. The priority order is fixed: P/E vs industry first, then P/E vs sector if no industry match, then P/S when earnings are negative, and P/B as the final fallback for pre-revenue companies.
Used when the company is profitable. Compares the current trailing P/E against the live industry average from market data. The most accurate benchmark because it measures like-for-like companies.
Used when the industry P/E is unavailable, has too few companies to be meaningful, or appears distorted by outliers. The broader sector average is used as a substitute. Less precise than an industry match but more reliable than no benchmark at all.
Used when earnings are negative or not meaningful. Price-to-Sales compares market cap against revenue, not profit. The benchmark is a fixed reference derived from the industry. Common for Early Growth and Standard companies with temporary losses.
Last resort for pre-revenue or near-zero revenue companies. Price-to-Book compares market cap against the net asset value on the balance sheet. At this stage the company is priced on its assets and potential, not earnings or revenue. P/B is also the default for Financial model companies, where book value is a more meaningful basis for comparison than earnings.
The Four Pillars
Each pillar asks one precise question about the business. The metric used to answer it changes depending on the model, because the right question for a bank is different from the right question for a pre-profit startup.
Growth measures whether the business is getting bigger. The core question is revenue momentum. For companies in decline or recovery, quarter-over-quarter growth is used instead of annual to catch directional change faster.
Quality measures the durability and efficiency of earnings. The right metric depends on whether the company is profitable and how it makes money. ROIC for profitable companies. Gross Margin for early-stage ones where unit economics matter more. Net Margin for financial companies where intermediation margins are the core business.
A company can report profit and still burn cash. REALITY checks whether money is actually flowing into the business. For early-stage companies that are not yet profitable, a negative OCF/Sales ratio is expected and not penalised in the same way, but the trend over time still matters.
Survival measures structural resilience. For companies that are already profitable, the question is debt load relative to earnings. For early-stage companies burning cash, the question shifts to how long they can survive at the current burn rate before needing to raise capital again.
Pillar Scores
Each pillar gets a label based on the calculated score. The label set depends on the model — Standard and Financial share one set, Early Growth and Degraded each have their own.
How to Read a BF Card
Start with the tag, then use the pillars to understand why.
The tag names the business character. ALL-ACE means every pillar is strong. SMART-BURN means it's losing money with a plan. The tag is the summary. the pillars explain it.
Is the price fair for what the company is? DISCOUNT + strong pillars is a rare setup. PREMIUM is fine if Growth and Quality are exceptional. but leaves no margin for error.
Look for the weakest pillar. A single FRAGILE score matters more than three PRIME scores. Growth and Quality drive the upside. Reality and Survival protect the downside.
The metric inside each pillar depends on the model. Early Growth uses different metrics than Standard. Comparing a Gross Margin score to an ROIC score is comparing apples to oranges.
BF tells you if the business deserves to move. PT tells you if now is the right time to enter. Strong BF + good PT setup = the full picture.