ZEVRA THERAPEUTICS, INC. (ZVRA) stock intrinsic value fair value estimate & owner earnings analysis

Zevra Therapeutics sells rare-disease medicines. The main product is MIPLYFFA (arimoclomol), approved by the FDA on September 20, 2024 for Niemann-Pick disease type C. It has orphan drug exclusivity through 2031. The company also sells OLPRUVA, a urea cycle disorder therapy, and earns some royalties. This is the first year the business has looked like a going commercial concern. Revenue was $23.6 million in 2024, $106.5 million in 2025, and $75.9 million in the first half of 2026 (first-half 2025 was $46.3 million). Before 2025 the company lost money every year, and it deducted stock-based pay and working capital swings, so our owner earnings per share were about $0.31 in 2021 and negative from 2022 to 2024. In 2025 they were about $0.21 per share. How we measured earnings: we started from operating cash flow and removed working-capital swings and stock compensation. We deducted only the maintenance share of the very small capital spending. The $150 million sale of a priority review voucher in 2025 produced a large accounting gain. It is not part of owner earnings, because it was a one-off asset sale and not the business's earning power. Owner earnings in earlier years used only the working-capital lines the filings tag, so they are approximate. Base case: Two quarters of 2026 (first-half operating cash flow of $23.2 million, against a $11.8 million outflow a year earlier) and three straight quarters of higher revenue support resetting the level above the 2025 figure. We use about $22 million a year, roughly $0.38 per share, held flat until the exclusivity on MIPLYFFA ends in September 2031. We give no credit for further patient growth, new indications, or the VEDS candidate (celiprolol), because none of those is secured. We also assume that the roughly $230 million of tax-loss carryforwards will not shield cash taxes forever. After 2031 nothing in the filings names a mechanism that keeps the earnings going, so we fade the earnings to zero over about three years. This gives about $2.00 per share. Bear case: The rival NPC therapy AQNEURSA (IntraBio), approved the same month, holds or gains share, and earnings stay at the 2025 level of about $12 million a year. The company has already written off $58.7 million of intangibles (mostly OLPRUVA) and $11.7 million of inventory in 2025, so further write-offs are plausible. Earnings then end with the 2031 exclusivity. It also carries a $60 million-plus term loan due in April 2029, whose interest is already in these numbers. This gives about $0.70 per share. Bull case: The first-half 2026 pace holds, about $40 million a year, through 2031 and fades over three years afterward. This gives about $3.50 per share. What would make this wrong: a single product drives almost all earnings, and it depends on one specialty pharmacy. We did not add the company's cash balance separately. Its interest income is in owner earnings, but principal beyond that is not credited, which is conservative. We could not confirm from the filings how long the patents on arimoclomol run beyond the exclusivity period.