{"id":5313,"date":"2026-07-02T15:18:50","date_gmt":"2026-07-02T15:18:50","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/tradertideinsights.com\/?p=5313"},"modified":"2026-07-02T15:18:50","modified_gmt":"2026-07-02T15:18:50","slug":"aerovironment-stock-rises-on-500m-army-contract-strong-results-boost-outlook","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/tradertideinsights.com\/?p=5313","title":{"rendered":"AeroVironment stock rises on $500M army contract, strong results boost outlook"},"content":{"rendered":"
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AeroVironment Inc. (AVAV) shares rose 4% in premarket trading on Thursday after the US Department of War awarded the defense contractor a $500 million contract for counter-unmanned aerial systems.<\/p>\n

The Simi Valley, California-based company received a firm-fixed-price contract to procure commercial counter-unmanned aerial systems and counter small-unmanned aerial systems capabilities. <\/p>\n

According to the Department of War, work locations and funding will be determined with each order placed under the agreement, which is expected to run through June 29, 2029.<\/p>\n

Army Contracting Command, Detroit Arsenal, Michigan, is the contracting activity for the agreement, which carries contract number W912CH-26-D-A073.<\/p>\n

The contract announcement added to investor optimism following AeroVironment’s strong fiscal fourth-quarter earnings report earlier this week. <\/p>\n

The company specializes in unmanned aircraft systems and tactical missile systems for military and commercial applications.<\/p>\n

Record quarterly results supported by acquisitions and backlog growth<\/h2>\n

AeroVironment reported record fiscal fourth-quarter revenue of $641.6 million<\/a> for the period ended April 30, 2026, up 133% from a year earlier.<\/p>\n

The sharp increase was aided by the acquisitions of defense technology companies BlueHalo and Empirical Systems Aerospace. Excluding those acquisitions, organic revenue growth was approximately 31%.<\/p>\n

Profitability also improved significantly. <\/p>\n

Non-GAAP adjusted EBITDA more than doubled to $140.1 million, lifting the adjusted EBITDA margin to 22%. Adjusted earnings per share increased to $1.84 from $1.61 in the prior-year quarter.<\/p>\n

The company’s funded backlog reached $1.2 billion at the end of fiscal 2026, compared with $726.6 million a year earlier, while full-year bookings totaled $2.7 billion against approximately $2 billion in revenue.<\/p>\n

That resulted in a book-to-bill ratio of 1.4, indicating orders continued to outpace shipments and providing greater visibility into future demand.<\/p>\n

Counter-drone business seen as long-term growth driver<\/h2>\n

While AeroVironment is widely known for its Switchblade loitering munitions, management believes its counter-drone business could become an increasingly important contributor over the coming years.<\/p>\n

Counter-unmanned aircraft systems generated about $200 million in revenue during fiscal 2026.<\/p>\n

The company is expanding the business through a three-layered approach that includes the Titan family of radio-frequency jamming systems, the LOCUST directed-energy weapon under development, and the Freedom Eagle-1 kinetic interceptor designed to destroy incoming drones.<\/p>\n

Discussing the long-term opportunity, CEO Wahid Nawabi said, “It will not surprise me in the next 3-5 years that our directed energy and our counter-UAS business would be equally as large, if not 2-3 times bigger.”<\/p>\n

Management also cited “unprecedented” demand across its markets and projected fiscal 2027 revenue of $2.1 billion to $2.2 billion, with the midpoint implying roughly 10% growth.<\/p>\n

Despite the recent gains, AeroVironment shares trade at about 54 times the midpoint of management’s fiscal 2027 adjusted earnings guidance and remain well below their 52-week high of nearly $420.<\/p>\n

Jim Cramer urged investors to remain cautious <\/a>because of negative sentiment surrounding the stock.<\/p>\n

\u201cThe short sellers in this thing are so powerful,\u201d he said on CNBC, adding they’re fully convinced that AeroVironment \u201cpaid too much\u201d for BlueHalo.<\/p>\n

According to Cramer, AVAV is trading near a bottom and a strong fourth-quarter report could help keep it in the \u201cgreen\u201d, but he warned of possible short-term volatility due to what he described as “a coordinated assault by institutional bears.”<\/p>\n

He also said investors should be cautious because the \u201clies that have been told about this company and shading of the truth\u201d are extraordinary.<\/p>\n

Wall Street, however, continues to rate AeroVironment a “Strong Buy,” with a mean price target of about $295 over the next 12 months.<\/p>\n

The post AeroVironment stock rises on $500M army contract, strong results boost outlook<\/a> appeared first on Invezz<\/a><\/p>\n

<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

AeroVironment Inc. (AVAV) shares rose 4% in premarket trading on Thursday after the US Department of War awarded the defense contractor a $500 million contract for counter-unmanned aerial systems.The Simi Valley, California-based company received a firm-fixed-price contract to procure commercial counter-unmanned aerial systems and counter small-unmanned aerial systems capabilities. According to the Department of War,…<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":5314,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[2],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-5313","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-stock"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/tradertideinsights.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/5313","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/tradertideinsights.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/tradertideinsights.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/tradertideinsights.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/tradertideinsights.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=5313"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/tradertideinsights.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/5313\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/tradertideinsights.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/media\/5314"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/tradertideinsights.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=5313"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/tradertideinsights.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=5313"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/tradertideinsights.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=5313"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}