MBGL · Research
Mobility Global Owns the CARFAX Record and the Debt That Paid for the Spin
CARFAX grew 8% and no customer tops 10% of revenue, but the spin left $2.0B of notes and S&P Global's finance chief on the board.
Spreadsheet & IC Deliverables: Download the formula-linked MBGL 5-tab Excel (.xlsx) workbook and printable 1-page tearsheet.
Download MBGL .xlsx →- CARFAX revenue growth
- 8%
- New senior notes
- $2B
- Vehicle history records
- 38 billion
1. Our call: Buy, because CARFAX is a real data gate, though the spin left it with debt and a parent on the board
Mobility Global is expected to post third quarter 2026 results on Nov 12, 2026, its first full quarter as a standalone company [9][3]. This piece is written on the latest filed quarter, the three months to Jun 30, 2026 [2].
We verified the name from its filings before writing. Mobility Global is the former S&P Global Mobility division, which S&P Global spun off on July 1, 2026 by distributing 100% of the shares to its holders, one for one; S&P Global keeps no stake [4].
It runs two segments, CARFAX and a business-to-business data unit [2].
Our call: Buy, conviction 3 of 5. CARFAX sells vehicle history, valuations and listings to consumers, more than 40,000 dealers and banks and insurers, and the B2B unit sells forecasts, planning data and marketing tools to carmakers, suppliers and dealers [1][2].
Screen. Mobility Global is a U.S. company based in Virginia, and its revenue is mostly data subscriptions, 82% of the June quarter, our calculation [3].
It sells to finance and insurance firms but does not process payments, and it does not rent cloud capacity, so it passes our screens
2. The car's record, sold to everyone who touches it
| Metric | Value |
|---|---|
| What it sells | CARFAX history, valuations and listings; B2B forecasts, planning and marketing data [1] |
| Revenue mix, June quarter | Subscription $383M, non-subscription $85M [3] |
| Regions, first half 2026 | U.S. $765M, international $158M [2] |
| Stock pay, 2025 | $22M, 1.3% of revenue, our calculation [1] |
| API quality | 4 of 5, our scoring: data delivered into dealer, lender and carmaker workflows [1] |
| Toll-gate score | 1 of 4 pass, 3 partial (section 2b) |
CARFAX had more than 38 billion vehicle history records from more than 177,000 sources at the end of 2025, including more than 92,000 dealers and service shops, 6,300 police agencies and 36 carmakers [1]. Its Car Care audience was more than 53 million consumers [1].
The company had about 3,522 staff on a full-time equivalent basis: 2,398 in the U.S. and Canada, 616 in Asia, 445 in Europe and 63 in Latin America [1].
No single customer was more than 10% of revenue in 2023, 2024 or 2025 [1].
New products in the quarter included CARFAX Homegrown, which flags cars sold new and serviced at the same dealer, and CARFAX Showroom, a premium listings product; CARFAX also launched in Germany [3].
2b. CARFAX owns the record a used car buyer checks
A gate is valuable when its owner holds a record others must check, owns the connection, prices close to outcomes and spends research on the gate. CARFAX holds the vehicle history record, built from contributed data, that buyers, dealers, lenders and insurers check before a used car changes hands [1].
| Test | Result | Evidence |
|---|---|---|
| Owns the record | Pass | More than 38 billion records from more than 177,000 sources [1]. |
| Owns the connection | Partial | Contributors supply the data, and supplier consolidation has raised fees [1]. |
| Prices close to outcomes | Partial | Dealers pay monthly per location; listings generate leads [2]. |
| R&D on the gate vs features | Partial | Capital spending was $24M in 2025, 1.4% of revenue, our calculation [1]. |
The verdict is one pass and three partials. In our reading, the brand and contributed data make the record hard to copy, but the record depends on suppliers that can charge more [1].
3. Growth: steady high single digits
Full year 2026 guidance is revenue of $1,870M to $1,885M, growth of 6.9% to 7.7%, and adjusted earnings before interest, tax, depreciation and amortization of $745M to $760M, about a 40% margin [3].
CARFAX segment revenue depends on the number of dealer locations, the monthly price per location and the bank and insurance customer base [2].
The 2023 base included $214M of acquisitions, net of cash acquired, while 2024 and 2025 spending on deals was $6M and $4M, so the last two years of growth were largely organic, in our reading [1].
In the June quarter subscription revenue grew 7% and non-subscription revenue 5% [3].
4. The quarter on Nov 12
The tests are whether revenue tracks the $1,870M to $1,885M guide, whether CARFAX growth holds at 8% and whether B2B growth improves from 4% [3].
Watch the first full quarter of standalone costs and interest on $2.0B of notes, and how much stand-up cost remains after $55M in the first half [2].
Watch capital returns: the board started a quarterly dividend in August [3].
5. Profit: amortization hides the margin
June quarter operating profit was $82M, a 17.5% margin against 21.9%, our calculation, and net income was $53M against $65M [3]. Stand-up costs were $34M in the quarter [2].
For 2025 operating profit was $339M, a 19.4% margin, after $296M of amortization of acquired intangibles; against 18.5% in 2024 and 16.1% in 2023, our calculations [1]. Net income was $220M in 2025, $208M in 2024 and $163M in 2023 [1].
Adjusted earnings before interest, tax, depreciation and amortization were $202M in the June quarter, a 43% margin [3].
In our reading, cash earnings are much higher than reported profit because the amortization comes from past deals and does not use cash [1].
6. Owner cash: strong as a division, untested alone
Owner cash is operating cash flow less capital spending, which includes capitalized technology, and all stock pay. For 2025 that was $485M of operating cash, less $24M of capital spending and $22M of stock pay [1].
First half 2026 operating cash was $189M against $233M, less $12M of capital spending and $9M of stock pay, hurt by working capital and stand-up costs [2].
These figures come from carve-out statements, so they carry only allocated S&P Global costs and almost no interest; the information statement warns that standalone costs may significantly exceed those allocations [1].
Interest on the new notes will be about $110.6M a year, our calculation from the coupons, which would cut 2025 owner cash by about a quarter before tax [2].
7. Capital: $2.0B of debt to pay the parent
On May 29, 2026 the company issued $650M of 5.05% notes due 2029, $650M of 5.45% notes due 2031 and $700M of 6.05% notes due 2036 [2]. Net transfers to S&P Global were $2,011M in the first half, so the debt largely funded a payment to the former parent [2].
Cash was $186M on Jun 30, 2026, so net debt was about $1.8B, our calculation, and a $500M revolving credit line became available on July 1 [2].
The share count is 294,821,320, set by the one-for-one distribution [2]. The company declared a small quarterly dividend in August and has not announced a buyback [3].
Before the spin, the business sent $433M to S&P Global in 2025, $373M in 2024 and $158M in 2023 [1].
8. The main risks are debt, standalone costs and data suppliers
Debt. The information statement warns that the new debt could limit flexibility and that covenants could accelerate it [1].
Standalone costs. As part of S&P Global the business shared scale in costs, staff and vendors, and its standalone costs may be higher [1].
Data suppliers. Supplier data sometimes has errors or delays, and consolidation among suppliers has raised the fees some charge [1].
Pay design. Before the spin, CARFAX officers held performance units tied to cumulative CARFAX U.S. earnings for 2025 to 2027, and Mr. Eager received a cliff-vesting unit grant in August 2025 that vests in August 2028 [1].
In our reading, those awards tie leadership to CARFAX results, the right gate.
Interest. The notes pay interest each June 15 and December 15, starting Dec 15, 2026, so the first coupon lands in the fourth quarter [2].
Debt issuance costs were about $16.0M [2].
Car market. B2B revenue grew only 4% in the June quarter and depends on carmaker and dealer budgets [3].
9. A CARFAX veteran in charge
William W. Eager is chief executive; he led S&P Global Mobility from August 2025 and before that worked at CARFAX for more than 20 years, as chief executive from 2021 [1].
Matthew A. Calderone is chief financial officer, Scott Fredericks runs CARFAX, Joseph S.
LaFeir runs the business solutions unit and Tasha Matharu is chief legal officer [1][4].
Leverage in context. Against the midpoint of adjusted earnings guidance, net debt of about $1.8B is moderate for a subscription data business, in our reading, but it removes room for large deals until it falls [2][3].
The Canada unit had a loan from an S&P Global affiliate that the separation removed [1].
Taxes. Tax expense was $106M in 2025 against $76M in 2024, a rate of 32.5%, our calculation, and the tax matters agreement leaves S&P Global responsible for most pre-spin combined returns [1].
A deferred tax benefit of $90M in 2025 lowered book tax, so taxes currently owed were higher than the reported expense, our reading [1]
10. Superintelligence on top of the record
The company says it uses machine learning to clean and combine raw data sets, and the chief executive said in August it would use smarter software to transform its workflows [1][3].
In our reading, better models help the owner of the cleanest record most, because the record is the scarce input [1]. The risk is that dealers and lenders build similar tools on data they already hold [1].
11. Control, pay, board ties and related parties
Control and buyout terms. Mobility Global has one class of common stock, every director is elected annually, the board has an independent chair, and the company opted into Delaware Section 203, which limits deals with holders above 15% [1].
Vote control. No holder controls the vote: BlackRock disclosed 11.3% as of Jul 31, 2026, and two Vanguard units disclosed 5.77% and 5.45% as of Sep 30, 2026 [7][8].
CEO awards. Mr. Eager was paid $6.44M in 2025 while at S&P Global [1].
From July 1 his salary rose to $0.9M with a target bonus of 150% of salary and a $2.5M unit grant [5]. In October the board approved one-time unit awards of $1.25M for Mr. Fredericks and $1.0M for Mr. LaFeir [6].
Change of control pay. The severance plan pays the chief executive two years of salary and target bonus in a lump sum, and other officers a year and a half, if fired without cause within six months before or 24 months after a change in control [5].
Activists. No activist filing appears; the only ownership filings are passive 13G reports [7]
12. The questions we would ask management, and the calls we are tracking
Question one: what are the full standalone costs once the transition services end? [1]
Question two: what does S&P Global pay for Mobility data, and the reverse? [1]
Question three: when will debt be paid down rather than refinanced? [2]
Question four: how fast are data supplier fees rising? [1]
Question five: can CARFAX keep growing near 8% with new products? That answer sets our conviction.
Prediction one: third quarter revenue exceeds $470M (65%). [3]
Prediction two: full year 2026 revenue guidance of $1,870M to $1,885M is held or raised on Nov 12 (70%). [3]
Prediction three: CARFAX segment revenue grows at least 7% in the Sep 30, 2026 quarter (65%). [3]
Bottom line: a real gate, carrying the parent's bill
CARFAX holds a record that used car buyers, dealers, lenders and insurers check, and the business throws off strong cash. The spin loaded it with debt to pay the former parent, its standalone costs are untested and the parent's finance chief sits on the board.
We would buy, but size it until the first standalone year proves the cash.
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