How much a stock's price changes over time is important for most investors, since price performance can both impact your investment portfolio and help you compare investment results across sectors and industries.
FOMO, or the fear of missing out, also plays a role in investing, particularly with tech giants and popular consumer-facing stocks.
What if you'd invested in Woodward (WWD) ten years ago? It may not have been easy to hold on to WWD for all that time, but if you did, how much would your investment be worth today?
Woodward's Business In-Depth
With that in mind, let's take a look at Woodward's main business drivers.
Headquartered in Fort Collins, CO, Woodward, Inc is an independent designer, manufacturer and service provider of energy control and optimization solutions for the aerospace and industrial markets.
Apart from serving original equipment manufacturers (OEMs), it also engages in aftermarket repairs, replacements and other service support operations for installed products.
Woodward serves the aerospace and energy markets through two reportable segments: Aerospace and Industrial.
The Aerospace segment’s products include metering units, actuators, air valves, fuel pumps, fuel nozzles, specialty valves, , and thrust reverser actuation systems for turbine engines and nacelles, flight deck controls, actuators, servocontrols, motors, and sensors for aircraft.
These segment’s products are utilized for commercial and private aircraft and rotorcraft. These are also widely deployed on military fixed-wing aircraft and rotorcraft, guided weapons, and other defense systems. This segment generated revenues of $494 million in first-quarter fiscal 2025, representing 63.9% of total revenues.
The company faces tough competition from companies like Honeywell, Moog, Eaton, Parker Hannifin, and RTX Corporation in this space.
The Industrial segment’s products portfolio includes solenoids, actuators, valves, pumps, fuel injection systems, ignition systems, control systems, electronics and software, and sensors.
The products are widely used in steam turbines, industrial gas turbines (like heavy frame, aeroderivative and small industrial gas turbines), compressors, and reciprocating engines (like low speed, medium speed, and high-speed engines, that operate on variety of fuels). Segmental revenues of $279 million in first-quarter fiscal 2025, represented 36.1% of total revenues.
Woodward’s primary competitors in this space include Heinzmann GmbH & Co., Emerson, EControls, Hoerbiger, Meggitt, Robert Bosch AG, and Triconix.
Bottom Line
Putting together a successful investment portfolio takes a combination of research, patience, and a little bit of risk. For Woodward, if you bought shares a decade ago, you're likely feeling really good about your investment today.
A $1000 investment made in May 2015 would be worth $4,023.02, or a 302.30% gain, as of May 2, 2025, according to our calculations. Investors should note that this return excludes dividends but includes price increases.
The S&P 500 rose 165.81% and the price of gold increased 163.05% over the same time frame in comparison.
Analysts are forecasting more upside for WWD too.
Woodward’s second-quarter performance gained from strength in Aerospace and Core Industrial (power generation, oil & gas, and marine transportation) segments. Aerospace growth was fueled by strong defense demand and a robust commercial after-market, partially offset by softer commercial OEM (owing to Being work stoppage) and defense after-market sales. Rise in smart defense spending is expected to drive defense OEM sales. Confident of navigating tariffs and current market conditions, the company raised the lower end of its sales and earnings guidance and reaffirmed full-year outlook for other metrics. Industrial segment revenues guidance narrowed to 7-9%, compared with 7-11% guided earlier. Volatile China on-highway natural-gas truck market, supply-chain woes within Aerospace, global macro uncertainty and rising costs remain concerns.
Shares have gained 8.91% over the past four weeks and there have been 4 higher earnings estimate revisions for fiscal 2025 compared to none lower. The consensus estimate has moved up as well.
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Woodward, Inc. (WWD): Free Stock Analysis ReportThis article originally published on Zacks Investment Research (zacks.com).
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