CSCO · Forward model · Bear case

The Bear case, 20 quarters out

Model as of 2026-08-27

Each segment is projected from its own operating driver, rolled up into consolidated cash flow, and discounted back to a fair value per share. The assumptions below are editable — change them and every number on this page moves with them.

Quarter labels are Cisco FISCAL quarters, so 2026 Q4 is the thirteen weeks ended 25 July 2026, reported 12 August 2026. The five verticals are exactly the groups of similar products and services Cisco discloses — Networking, Security, Collaboration, Observability, Services — and they sum to reported consolidated revenue in all twelve quarters, with a maximum residual of $1M, which is the rounding Cisco itself discloses. Ten of the twelve quarters are read from the filed disaggregation-of-revenue note; FY2024 Q4 and FY2025 Q4 are fiscal year less nine months and are flagged estimated. AI infrastructure is NOT a vertical: it is disclosed annually only (about $4bn of FY2026 revenue, $7.5bn guided for FY2027, $9.3bn of FY2026 orders) and sits inside Networking. Every vertical margin is assumed, because Cisco discloses gross margin by geography and never by product category; the 0.5% corporate overhead is the plug that reconciles the revenue-weighted assumed margins ($22,351M) to the disclosed FY2026 non-GAAP operating income of $22,040M. Segment 'EBITDA' here therefore tracks Cisco's non-GAAP operating margin, which excludes share-based compensation of $3,830M. Tax 18.5% is the company's own FY2027 non-GAAP assumption. netCash is cash $7,218M plus investments $8,700M less short-term debt $10,161M and long-term debt $19,372M, so Cisco is $13.6bn net DEBT. Shares are the 3,941,434,665 on the Q3 FY2026 10-Q cover; the FY2026 10-K was not filed as of 2026-08-27. Price is the 26 August 2026 close of $112.36. The engine carries no seasonality, and Cisco's fiscal Q1 is seasonally its weakest quarter, so the base case is calibrated to the FULL-YEAR guide: FY2027 lands at $73.3bn inside the guided $72.2-73.4bn, with the first projected quarter at $17.9bn just under the guided $18.0-18.2bn. Reading the quarter alone would have broken the year.

Where each case comes from

From cash flow to fair value

The projected path

The published model's 20 quarters. The horizon and sliders above do not change this table.

Every row is projected. A year-over-year change is shown only where the quarter it compares against exists — an em dash means there is no comparable quarter, not a flat year.

Model revisions

Assumptions are marked to reality as each quarter prints. Every change is appended here, with the fair value the model produced at the time, so the model's own history stays visible.