The Max Noble Score.
Every company I cover gets one number and one sentence. The number runs from −100 to +100: the higher, the stronger the company’s hand. Here is how it works.
Annual reports were written for regulators. I write for people.
A listed company publishes hundreds of pages a year. The employee, the student, the supplier and the board member all need to understand it. Few of them have a spare weekend for the notes to the accounts. I read the pages, and come back with the five minutes that matter.
Every conclusion links to evidence.
Nothing is asserted. Everything is shown.
Every number comes from the original filing.
Audited annual reports and official filings. Never second-hand.
Every report is written to be understood.
If a sentence needs translating, I rewrite it.
Promised. Delivered. Verdict.
Every company tells you what it will do. The filings tell you what it did. I read both, and say plainly what the gap means.
The filing
I start with the audited annual report and the official filings. Never a summary of a summary.
Promised against delivered
What management said it would do, set against what happened. The gap is where the story is.
The verdict
One number, one sentence. Always with the reasons, always with the sources.
What it means
What the business teaches, and what to watch next. Never a tip to buy or sell.
One number. One sentence.
The Score measures strategic strength: where the company stands, the promises it keeps and its numbers, read together. It runs from −100 to +100. +100 is the strongest hand in business. 0 is the line between gaining ground and losing it. −100 means a court has declared the company bankrupt. It judges the business, never the share price.
Then the verdict, in one sentence, with every reason one click away.
- +60 and above
- A strong hand
- The company sets the terms.
- +1 to +59
- Gaining ground
- More strengths than weak spots.
- 0
- Even
- The line between gaining ground and losing it.
- −1 to −59
- Losing ground
- More weak spots than strengths.
- −60 and below
- A weak hand
- Others decide its future. −100: declared bankrupt.
Position
Where the company stands against its rivals, customers and suppliers. Who sets the price, and who can walk away.
Promises kept
What the leaders said they would do, set against what they did. Every promise kept adds strength. Every promise broken takes it away.
The numbers
Cash, debt and profit, from the filings. A going-concern note or a covenant breach caps the Score, however good the rest looks.
On the Morning Brief
Every company on the Morning Brief carries its Score and one of four words. Filed and Bankrupt are facts from courts and filings. Watch and Warning are my reading of the signs.
- Watch
- +1 to +99 · Signs worth watching
- Warning
- 0 to −79 · Several serious signs at once
- Filed
- −80 to −99 · A court process has begun
- Bankrupt
- −100 · Declared bankrupt by a court
How the old numbers moved
Until 31 October 2026 the list showed a number from 0 to 100, where higher meant closer to bankruptcy. Every old reading moves the same way: the new Score is 100 minus twice the old number. 95 became −90. 50 became 0. Nothing was re-judged in the move. Every Score is logged with its date, and when I am wrong, the record stays next to the calls I got right.