Wabtec Q4 Earnings & Revenues Beat Estimates, Both Increase Y/Y

Wabtec Corporation WAB reported encouraging fourth-quarter 2025 results wherein both earnings and revenues surpassed the Zacks Consensus Estimate and increased year over year.

Quarterly earnings per share of $2.10 beat the Zacks Consensus Estimate of $2.07 and improved 25% year over year due to higher sales and operating margin expansion. Revenues of $2.97 billion outpaced the Zacks Consensus Estimate of $2.86 billion. The top line grew 14.8% year over year due to higher sales in the Freight segment, which included acquisitions (Inspection Technologies & Frauscher Sensor Technology). Robust sales in the Transit segment also aided the top line.

WAB’s Segmental Highlights

Freight segment’s net sales of $2.1 billion grew 18.3% year over year. The upside was aided by growth in Equipment sales (up 33% driven by higher locomotive deliveries), Digital sales (up 74.4% owing to the acquisitions of Inspection Technologies & Frauscher Sensor Technology) and Components sales. Freight segment’s adjusted operating margin grew to 22.1% from 19.7% in the year-ago quarter.

In the Transit segment, net sales grew 6.7% year over year to $842 million due to strong aftermarket and original equipment sales. The segmental adjusted operating margin contracted 2.4 points to 14%. The metric was hurt by manufacturing inefficiencies and higher operating expenses as a percentage of revenues.

Wabtec Price, Consensus and EPS Surprise

Wabtec price-consensus-eps-surprise-chart | Wabtec Quote

Other Q4 Details of WAB 

Total operating expenses in the reported quarter increased by $147 million from a year ago to $610 million. Operating ratio (operating expenses as a percentage of net sales) deteriorated to 20.6% from 17.9% a year ago. A lower value of the metric is desirable.

Wabtec exited the fourth quarter with cash, cash equivalents and restricted cash of $789 million compared with $710 million at 2024-end. Long-term debt was $4.3 billion compared with $3.5 billion at the prior year-end.

During the reported quarter, WAB repurchased shares worth $75 million. Its board increased the existing share repurchase authorization to $1.2 billion.

WAB’s Impressive 2026 Guidance

Wabtec expects sales in the range of $12.19-$12.49 billion. The Zacks Consensus Estimate is pegged at $11.91 billion. The company anticipates adjusted earnings per share to be in the $10.05-$10.45 range. The mid-point of the guided range ($10.25) is well above the Zacks Consensus Estimate of $10.13 per share. The guidance includes the impact from the recent acquisition of Dellner Couplers, which closed on Feb. 10, 2026. The tax rate is expected to be roughly 24.5%.

Zacks Rank

WAB currently carries a Zacks Rank #2 (Buy). You can see the complete list of today’s Zacks #1 Rank (Strong Buy) stocks here.

Q4 Performances of Other Transportation Companies

Delta Air Lines DAL reported fourth-quarter 2025 earnings (excluding 31 cents from non-recurring items) of $1.55 per share, which beat the Zacks Consensus Estimate of $1.53. Earnings decreased 16.22% on a year-over-year basis due to high labor costs.

Revenues in the December-end quarter were $16 billion, beating the Zacks Consensus Estimate of $15.63 billion and increasing 2.9% on a year-over-year basis. Adjusted operating revenues (excluding third-party refinery sales) increased 1.2% year over year to $14.6 billion. Revenue growth was impacted by about 2 points due to the government shutdown, mainly in the domestic segment, consistent with the company's disclosure last month.

J.B. Hunt Transport Services, Inc. JBHT reported fourth-quarter 2025 earnings of $1.90 per share, which surpassed the Zacks Consensus Estimate of $1.81 and improved 24.2% year over year.

Total operating revenues of $3.09 billion lagged the Zacks Consensus Estimate of $3.12 billion and were down 1.6% year over year. JBHT’s fourth-quarter revenue performance was hurt by a 2% and 4% decline in revenue per load excluding fuel surcharge revenue in Intermodal and Truckload, respectively, a 1% decrease in average trucks in Dedicated Contract Services, and a 7% and 2% decline in load volume in Integrated Capacity Solutions and JBI, respectively.

United Airlines’ UAL fourth-quarter 2025 adjusted earnings per share (excluding 9 cents from non-recurring items) of $3.10 surpassed the Zacks Consensus Estimate of $2.98 but declined 4.9% on a year-over-year basis. The reported figure lies within the guided range of $3.00-$3.50.

Operating revenues of $15.4 billion outpaced the Zacks Consensus Estimate marginally by 0.1% and increased 4.8% year over year. Passenger revenues (which accounted for 90.4% of the top line) increased 4.9% year over year to $13.9 billion. UAL flights transported 45,679 passengers in the fourth quarter, up 3% year over year.

Cargo revenues fell 6% year over year to $490 million. Revenues from other sources rose 9.1% year over year to $981 million.

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This article originally published on Zacks Investment Research (zacks.com).

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