Off-calendar peers report years that straddle two calendar years; weight them by months before a single multiple is computed.
To calendarise a peer's EBITDA, weight its two fiscal years by the months each contributes to the calendar year you are valuing. A peer with a March year-end has 3 months of calendar 2026 in the fiscal year ending March 2026 and 9 months in the year ending March 2027, so calendar 2026 EBITDA is 3/12 × 120.0 + 9/12 × 138.0 = 133.5. Using the fiscal figure of 120.0 instead overstates that peer's multiple by 11.2 per cent, and lifts the median of the set from 10.40x to 10.67x.
Worked in full in Business Valuation by Julian R. Sterling, with every figure reproduced in a free workbook.See the book on Amazon →
A comparable company analysis divides each peer's enterprise value by an earnings figure and takes the median. That only works if every earnings figure covers the same twelve months as the subject's. Peers with March, June or September year-ends report fiscal years that straddle two calendar years, and a growing company's older months are its smaller ones. Calendarisation puts every peer on the subject's calendar before any multiple is computed.
| Peer | Year-end | FY ending in 2026 | FY ending in 2027 | Enterprise value |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Peer A | March | 120.0 | 138.0 | 1,602 |
| Peer B | June | 210.0 | 231.0 | 2,425 |
| Peer C | September | 84.0 | 90.0 | 812 |
| Peer D | December | 300.0 | n/a | 2,940 |
The subject's calendar 2026 EBITDA is 50.0. Fiscal years ending in 2027 are consensus or management forecasts; when they are, the calendarised figure is partly a forecast too, and the comparison is with the subject's forecast for the same period.
Calendar-year EBITDA = (m ÷ 12) × EBITDA of the fiscal year ending in month m of the calendar year + ((12 − m) ÷ 12) × EBITDA of the following fiscal year
Excel, with the year-end month in B2 and the two fiscal years in C2 and D2: =B2/12*C2+(12-B2)/12*D2
Fiscal year ending March 2026 runs April 2025 to March 2026: 3 months fall in 2026.
CY2026 = 3/12 × 120.0 + 9/12 × 138.0 = 30.0 + 103.5 = 133.5
CY2026 = 6/12 × 210.0 + 6/12 × 231.0 = 105.0 + 115.5 = 220.5
CY2026 = 9/12 × 84.0 + 3/12 × 90.0 = 63.0 + 22.5 = 85.5
Already on the calendar: 300.0
| Peer | Fiscal EBITDA growth | Fiscal multiple | Calendar multiple | Overstatement |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Peer A | 15.0% | 13.35x | 12.00x | 11.2% |
| Peer B | 10.0% | 11.55x | 11.00x | 5.0% |
| Peer C | 7.1% | 9.67x | 9.50x | 1.8% |
| Peer D | n/a | 9.80x | 9.80x | 0.0% |
| Median | 10.67x | 10.40x | 2.6% |
Applied to the subject's 50.0 of calendar 2026 EBITDA, the fiscal median gives an enterprise value of 533.7 and the calendar median 519.9: a difference of 13.7, or 2.6 per cent, from a step that takes ten minutes. The mean moves more, from 11.09x to 10.57x, because the largest distortion sits on the highest multiple. Which of the two statistics to report is a separate decision, worked in mean or median multiple in a comparable company analysis.
The direction is predictable. For a growing peer, the fiscal year ending in 2026 contains older, smaller months, so its EBITDA is lower than calendar 2026 and its multiple is higher. Leaving growing off-calendar peers uncalendarised biases the median up and overvalues the subject.
The overstatement equals the share of the year that falls in the later fiscal year, multiplied by the growth between the two fiscal years.
| EBITDA growth | March year-end | June year-end | September year-end |
|---|---|---|---|
| 0% | 0.0% | 0.0% | 0.0% |
| 5% | 3.8% | 2.5% | 1.2% |
| 10% | 7.5% | 5.0% | 2.5% |
| 20% | 15.0% | 10.0% | 5.0% |
| 30% | 22.5% | 15.0% | 7.5% |
For a mature peer growing at 5 per cent, calendarisation barely matters. For a peer growing at 20 or 30 per cent with a March year-end, the error is larger than the gap between most trading multiples, and in sectors full of growth companies with mixed year-ends it decides where the median lands.
Weight each off-calendar peer's two fiscal years by the months they contribute, then compute the multiples. Here calendarising takes Peer A from 13.35x to 12.00x and the median from 10.67x to 10.40x, 13.7 of enterprise value on a subject with 50.0 of EBITDA. The book's three values for one company, with the trading set behind them, are in the free Business Valuation workbooks.
Restating every peer's financials to the same twelve-month period as the subject, usually the subject's calendar year. A peer with a June year-end contributes half of each fiscal year: 6/12 of 210.0 plus 6/12 of 231.0 gives 220.5 of calendar 2026 EBITDA, which takes its multiple from 11.55x to 11.00x.
For a growing peer, it lowers it. The fiscal year ending before December contains older, smaller months, so calendar-year EBITDA is higher and the multiple lower. With 10 per cent growth, a March year-end peer's fiscal multiple is 7.5 per cent too high; with flat earnings there is no difference.
Months are the standard shortcut and assume earnings accrue evenly. For a seasonal business, add up the four reported or forecast quarters that fall in the target year instead. Either way, check the period end date rather than the fiscal year label: a March company's FY2026 has only 3 of its 12 months, 25 per cent, in 2026.
This article is one calculation from Business Valuation. The book takes the same case from first principles to the decision, chapter by chapter, and every figure it prints is a live formula in the free companion workbooks.
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