Fair Isaac (FICO) RSU sell-vs-hold
Calculator · free · no signup · FICOSell at vest or hold? Compare after-tax payout from selling Fair Isaac RSUs at vest vs. holding through the LTCG cliff at 12 months.
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Your vest
Tax inputs
Hold strategy
Best after-tax payout — at year 1 yr
$47,709
Sell + invest wins by $4,981 over Hold 1 yr.
Estimates only. Not financial advice.
Heads-up: under-withholding. Your employer withholds federal tax at the IRS supplemental rate (22.0% on this vest, ≈ $17,600). Your marginal federal rate on this vest is 32.7%, owing $26,171. Expect to settle the $8,571 gap at tax time.
The hidden purchase
Tax was paid at vest either way. Holding is mathematically equivalent to taking $44,509 in after-tax cash and buying $44,509 of FICO today.
Most diversification frameworks would advise against a purchase that size in a single name; the right answer depends on your conviction in FICO. Holding past one year converts the gain to LTCG.
Sell + invest
Best payout| Vest value (shares × price) | $80,000 |
| Federal | |
| State | |
| Medicare | −$1,160 |
| Additional Medicare | −$720 |
| Market gain over 1 yr at 10.0% | $4,451 |
| Cap-gain tax on diversified gain — LTCG (federal + state + NIIT) | −$1,251 |
| Net at year 1 yr | $47,709 |
Sell every share at vest; invest the after-tax cash at the market return for 1 yr, then liquidate. Diversified — no single-stock concentration risk.
Hold 1 yr
| Vest value (shares × price) | $80,000 |
| Vest tax (federal + state + FICA) | |
| Net at year 1 yr | $42,728 |
Sold 444 shares to cover vest tax (net-settled); kept 556 shares 1 yr to qualify for long-term capital gains.
Social Security + Medicare are payroll taxes (collectively called FICA) — they apply because you're still employed at vest.
Both columns are stated in year-1 yr dollars. The sell side compounds at the market return; the hold side compounds at your single-stock expected return after a 20% volatility drag.
Estimates only. Assumes net-settled (sell-to-cover) vesting; double-trigger and pre-IPO RSUs are out of scope. Excludes multi-state moves, AMT interactions on other equity, and 83(b) elections. Not financial advice.
You evaluated one RSU vest. The beta plans every vest of every grant across years, with concentration and AMT in the loop.
Request beta access →Related calculators: RSU Lot Order Calculator · Stock Concentration Calculator
About Fair Isaac
Fair Isaac (FICO) is a public Data company, incorporated in Delaware and headquartered in Bozeman, MT.
Last close: $1,078.12 per share (as of 2026-08-18).
Equity grants at Fair Isaac typically include restricted stock units (RSUs).
FICO, originally Fair, Isaac and Company, is an American data analytics company based in Bozeman, Montana, focused on credit scoring services. It was founded by Bill Fair and Earl Isaac in 1956. Its FICO score, a measure of consumer credit risk, has become a fixture of consumer lending in the United States.
Source: Wikipedia (CC BY-SA 4.0)
Engineer Bill Fair and mathematician Earl Isaac founded the firm in 1956 to apply statistical scoring to credit decisions, and the FICO score they eventually produced became the default measure of consumer creditworthiness in the United States. Two businesses sit under one roof: scores, which are licensed through the three credit bureaus and carry almost no incremental cost per pull, and software for fraud detection and decision management sold to banks and insurers. The scores business is unusually profitable because the asset is a standard rather than a product. Mortgage origination volume drives the cyclical part of revenue. Headquarters are in Bozeman, Montana.
Sources: sec.gov · en.wikipedia.org
OptionsAhoy is an independent tool and is not affiliated with, endorsed by, or sponsored by Fair Isaac.
Fair Isaac (FICO) RSUs vest as ordinary income at the price on vest day. The decision is whether to sell at vest and reinvest, or hold the shares through the 12-month LTCG cliff. This calculator runs both paths through the same after-tax math so you can compare like-for-like.
Example: 500 Fair Isaac (FICO) RSUs vesting at $1,078.12 per share is $539,060 of ordinary income on vest day. After roughly 32% combined federal + state + FICA (~$172,499), the post-tax share value is ~$366,561. Holding 12 months for long-term capital-gains treatment then only matters for the price change between vest and sale; the ordinary income at vest is already locked in. The calculator runs both paths through the same after-tax math.
All Fair Isaac tools → · Use the generic RSU Sell-vs-Hold Calculator for any company. Diversifying multiple RSU lots? See the lot-by-lot sell order →
Fair Isaac equity questions
- Should I sell or hold my Fair Isaac RSUs at vest?
- Fair Isaac restricted stock units (RSUs) are taxed as ordinary income on their value at vest whether or not you sell. The only open decision is what to do with the shares afterward: sell at vest and reinvest, or hold past twelve months for long-term capital-gains treatment on any further gain. The calculator above runs both paths through the same after-tax math so you can compare them directly.
- Does Fair Isaac grant ISOs, NSOs, or RSUs?
- Equity compensation at Fair Isaac typically takes the form of restricted stock units (RSUs). Restricted stock units are taxed as ordinary income when they vest.
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