El Pollo Loco Holdings

LOCO

Restaurants · Consumer Cyclical

Price

$16.59

+0.04 (+0.24%)

Market Cap

$505.3M

Exchange

NASDAQ

Winston Score

Winston is curious

A decent business — some strong pillars, some weaker.

Share count falling — buybacks

−19.0% over 4y

The company has reduced its share count over this period, returning value to shareholders through buybacks.

Diluted shares outstanding: 36.4M (2021) → 29.5M (2025)

El Pollo Loco Holdings, Inc., through its subsidiary, El Pollo Loco, Inc., develops, franchises, licenses, and operates quick-service restaurants under the El Pollo Loco name. As of May 04, 2022, the company operated 480 restaurants comprising 189 company-operated and 291 franchised restaurants located in California, Nevada, Arizona, Texas, Utah, and Louisiana. It also licenses one restaurant in the Philippines. The company was formerly known as Chicken Acquisition Corp. and changed its name to

Winston Score History

Growth Profile

For growth stock investors

When traditional metrics don't capture the full picture, these are the signals growth stock investors use instead.

Revenue Growth

+5.9% YoY

YoY Growth Rate

Slow revenue growth

EPS Growth

+47.4% YoY

YoY Growth Rate

EPS growth accelerating

R&D Spend

$0/ year

0.0% of revenue

Below sector average (4%)

Research and development spending

Insider Activity

17.7%ownership

→ Flat

Insiders holding steady — not selling despite ability to

Cash Position

Cash flow positive

$4M cash & investments

Quarterly Free Cash Flow

↓ Burn rate worsening

Company generates more cash than it spends — no dilution risk from fundraising

Growth context

El Pollo Loco Holdings is growing revenue at 6% year-over-year. The Winston Score measures business quality today — these growth metrics show what could matter tomorrow.

The Winston Score above measures business quality today. Growth stocks often score lower because they invest in the future rather than maximising current profits. These metrics show what matters most for evaluating that future.

Score breakdown

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Quality

Gross Margin

28.8%

Modest — 28.8% gross margin

Operating Margin

9.8%

Modest — 9.8% operating margin

ROCE

3.4%

Weak — 3.4% return on capital

ROIC between 0% and 5%. They earn a few cents back per dollar invested in the business.

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Growth

Sales YoY

+4.4%

Slow sales growth (4.4% YoY)

EPS YoY

+16.5%

Earnings growing fast (16.5% YoY)

Healthy double-digit earnings growth — what compounders look like.

EPS Consistency

6/8 quarters

Earnings grew in most of the last 8 quarters

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Cash Flow

Cash Conversion

193%

Turns 193% of profit into real cash

FCF Margin

5.4%

Thin free cash flow (5.4%)

FCF margin between 0% and 10%. Some cash from sales, but not a lot.

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Stability

Debt / Equity

0.20

Conservative — low debt load (0.20)

Interest Cover

11.52x

Comfortably covers interest (11.5x)

Interest coverage above 8. Profits cover interest many times over.

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Valuation

P/E Ratio (TTM)

16.8x

Fair value — P/E 16.8

P/E in the normal range. Price is roughly $15 for every $1 of yearly profit.

P/E vs Forward

-0.4

SLOWING

Earnings expected to fall — forward P/E higher than today

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Dividends

Not applicable for this business.

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