Franklin Universal Trust (FT): fair value, margin of safety and Wheel Score

Is FT undervalued?

FT has a margin of safety of 51%: the stock closed at 7.42 on 5 Nov 2026 against a GLS average fair value of 15.23. 6 of the 9 valuation models that produced a number sit above the price. Our scans treat a discount this large as a strong starting point for a cash-secured put, not as a verdict - the fair value is a model output, and a wide gap can mean the models are missing something the market knows.

The 9 models disagree widely: DCF gives 1.84 while GLS Growth gives 37.80. A spread that wide means the average is sensitive to which methods you trust; the model table below shows where each one lands, and the Quote page lets you switch any of them off.

The nightly engine files FT under Speculative - it is losing money or its Piotroski health score is 3 or lower - which caps its Wheel Score at 45 and keeps it out of the Sunday Scan. It also carries the Income tag (Income = a dividend yield of 4% or more).

Nine valuation models for FT

Each model turns the latest filed numbers into a value per share; the GLS fair value is the simple average of the ones that produce a positive number. The last two rows are shown for reference and never enter the average. The Quote page lets you switch any model off and add your own margin of safety.

Quality and financial health

Financial health is weak: FT passes 3 of the nine Piotroski tests. Our scans drop the stock at the health filter; a low score is often the reason a stock looks cheap on the valuation models. The GLS Moat score is 5.7 out of 10: a record that is solid on some of the four parts the score weighs (returns on capital, pricing power, lasting growth, balance sheet) and weaker on others.

Returns on capital are moderate - ROIC 5.6%, ROE 7.2%, ROA 5.6% - with debt at 0.28 times equity and a free-cash-flow yield of 4.8%.

The dividend yield is high at 6.87% (payout ratio 83%). A yield this size is often the market's way of pricing a risk to the payout, so the health score and cash flow matter more than usual.

Institutional ownership scores 2/10, insider activity 5/10 and Congressional trading 5/10 on the GLS smart-money scales.

Wheel Score 30: No options

FT has no listed options in the nightly snapshot, so there is nothing to sell and the stock cannot be wheeled however good the business. It fails the first Wheel Trade Filter (options that actually trade), so the score stays under 70 and is shown as "No options" (30 here). The valuation and quality numbers still apply to owning the shares outright.

Volume runs at 35k shares a day on a market cap of $187M, with a beta of 0.64 - a low beta, so day-to-day moves are smaller than the market's; the Stability part of the Wheel Score rates that fair.

The Wheel Score ranks ~7,400 US stocks for selling cash-secured puts and covered calls: a stock must pass all 9 Wheel Trade Filters to score 70, and the score then ranks the ones that pass; the Sunday Scan is the top 10. It is updated nightly and is not a recommendation. How the Wheel Score works · the walkthrough lesson shows how it fits into a trade, start to finish.

Upcoming events

No upcoming earnings date is recorded for FT in the nightly calendar. The shares go ex-dividend on 20 Nov 2026 (0.0425 per share), so a covered call sold before then carries a small early-assignment risk around that date.

Earnings, dividend, IPO, split and economic calendars for the whole market, filterable to your watchlists.

Similar stocks in Asset Management

The 12 companies below are the closest to Franklin Universal Trust by market cap within the Asset Management industry, each with its own fact sheet; the Compare page puts up to eight of them side by side.

⚖ Compare FT with 7 of them   All Financial Services stocks →