Is InterDigital Good Enough for You?
By Seth Jayson (TMF Bent) | More Articles
May 6, 2011 | Comments (0)
Margins matter. The more InterDigital (Nasdaq: IDCC ) keeps of each buck it earns in revenue, the more money it has to invest in growth, fund new strategic plans, or (gasp!) distribute to shareholders. Healthy margins often separate pretenders from the best stocks in the market. That's why I check on my holdings' margins at least once a quarter. I'm looking for the absolute numbers, comparisons with sector peers and competitors, and any trend that may tell me how strong InterDigital’s competitive position could be.
Here's the current margin snapshot for InterDigital and some of its sector and industry peers and direct competitors.
Company
TTM Gross Margin
TTM Operating Margin
TTM Net Margin
InterDigital 84.0% 55.6% 35.9%
Qualcomm (Nasdaq: QCOM ) 68.3% 33.4% 29.5%
LM Ericsson Telephone (Nasdaq: ERIC ) 38.2% 12.5% 6.6%
Nokia (NYSE: NOK ) 29.8% 5.1% 4.3%
Source: Capital IQ, a division of Standard & Poor's. TTM = trailing 12 months.
Unfortunately, that table doesn't tell us much about where InterDigital has been, or where it's going. A company with rising gross and operating margins often fuels its growth by increasing demand for its products. If it sells more units while keeping costs in check, its profitability increases. Conversely, a company with gross margins that inch downward over time is often losing out to competition and possibly engaging in a race to the bottom on prices. If it can't make up for this problem by cutting costs -- and most companies can't -- then both the business and its shares face a decidedly bleak outlook.
Of course, over the short term, the kind of economic shocks we recently experienced can drastically affect a company's profitability. That's why I like to look at five fiscal years' worth of margins, along with the results for the trailing 12 months (TTM), the last fiscal year, and the last fiscal quarter (LFQ). You can't always reach a hard conclusion about your company's health, but you can better understand what to expect and what to watch.
Here's the margin picture for InterDigital over the past few years.
Source: Capital IQ, a division of Standard & Poor's. Dollar amounts in millions. FY = fiscal year. TTM = trailing 12 months.
(Because of seasonality in some businesses, the numbers for the last period on the right -- the TTM figures -- aren't always comparable to the FY results preceding them.)
Here's how the stats break down:
•Over the past five years, gross margin peaked at 89.4% and averaged 78.7%. Operating margin peaked at 70.0% and averaged 42.3%. Net margin peaked at 46.9% and averaged 27.0%.
•TTM gross margin is 84.0%, 530 basis points better than the five-year average. TTM operating margin is 55.6%, 1,330 basis points better than the five-year average. TTM net margin is 35.9%, 890 basis points better than the five-year average.
With recent TTM operating margins exceeding historical averages, InterDigital looks to be doing fine.
If you take the time to read past the headlines and crack a filing now and then, you're probably ahead of 95% of the market's individual investors. To stay ahead, learn more about how I use analysis like this to help me uncover the best returns in the stock market. Have an opinion on the margins at InterDigital? Let us know in the comments section below.
•Add InterDigital to My Watchlist.
•Add Qualcomm to My Watchlist.
•Add LM Ericsson Telephone to My Watchlist.
•Add Nokia to My Watchlist.
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.Seth Jayson had no position in any company mentioned here at the time of publication. You can view his stock holdings. He is a co-advisor of Motley Fool Hidden Gems, which provides new small-cap ideas every month, backed by a real-money portfolio. InterDigital is a Motley Fool Stock Advisor pick. The Fool owns shares of Qualcomm. Try any of our Foolish newsletter services free for 30 days. We Fools don't all hold the same opinions, but we all believe that considering a diverse range of insights makes us better investors. The Motley Fool has a disclosure policy.
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