Total debt divided by shareholders' equity — measures how much a company has borrowed relative to what shareholders have invested.
Debt-to-Equity Ratio (D/E) — Total debt divided by shareholders' equity — measures how much a company has borrowed relative to what shareholders have invested.
Key facts
Category
Financial Health
Definition
Total debt divided by shareholders' equity — measures how much a company has borrowed relative to what shareholders have invested.
$10B debt, $20B equity → D/E = 0.5 (debt is half of equity).
Interpretive bands
< 0.5
Conservative leverage. Common for tech, biotech, consumer staples.
0.5 – 1.5
Moderate. Typical for industrials and most consumer cyclicals.
> 1.5
High leverage. Standard for utilities (regulated cash flows), banks (different metric entirely).
> 3.0
Aggressive. Significant interest-rate sensitivity and refinancing risk.
How IndexAlpha uses Debt-to-Equity Ratio (D/E)
On the Financial Health card with sector-relative shading. Compare a stock's D/E against same-sector peers, not the overall market.
See it live
The Debt-to-Equity Ratio (D/E) metric shows up on every IndexAlpha research page. See it now on VZ — or research any stock to view its Debt-to-Equity Ratio (D/E).