Powell Industries booked $934m of new orders against $312m of revenue, and one data centre order accounts for more than $400m of that
Orders tripled shipments.
Powell Industries told the Securities and Exchange Commission at 16.28 on Monday that new orders in its fiscal third quarter reached $934m, against revenue of $312m. Orders in the same quarter a year earlier were $362m. In the quarter immediately before this one they were $490m. Brett A. Cope, the chairman and chief executive, described the resulting book-to-bill ratio as 3.0 times in the release attached to the filing.
Backlog stood at $2.4bn on 30 June, against $1.4bn a year earlier and $1.8bn three months earlier.
Three orders above $50m, and one of them is most of the story
The release defines a mega order as one with a contract value above $50 million, and reports three of them in the quarter. The largest is a data centre order with a value exceeding $400 million, which the company describes as related to a behind-the-meter design of on-site generation assets. A fertiliser order in the petrochemical market came in at roughly $75 million. An order supporting the liquefaction and export of liquefied natural gas along the United States Gulf Coast came in at roughly $60 million.
One contract was therefore worth more than everything the company billed in the three months.
The quarter itself was ordinary
Revenue of $311.7m was 9 percent above the $286.3m of a year earlier, and 5 percent above the $296.6m of the preceding quarter. Gross profit was $95.3m, or 30.6 percent of revenue, against 30.7 percent a year earlier. Net income was $52.2m, or $1.42 a diluted share, against $48.2m and $1.32. Every per-share figure in the filing is restated for the three-for-one stock split the company effected on 2 April.
The mix moved more than the total. Commercial and other industrial revenue grew 54 percent and electric utility revenue grew 18 percent, while petrochemical revenue fell 49 percent.
Cash and short-term investments were $633.6m at 30 June, against $475.5m at the September year end.
The warning attached to the number
The company prints its own caveat against the figure carrying the story. Amounts recorded in backlog, footnote 3 says, may not be a reliable indicator of future operating results and may not be indicative of continuing revenue performance over future fiscal quarters or years, primarily because of unexpected contract adjustments, cancellations or scope reductions.
Michael Metcalf, the chief financial officer, said the expansion of the company's Jacintoport fabrication yard is expected to be complete by the close of fiscal 2026, and that greenfield capacity expansions are being evaluated beyond leased space already added in Houston and Ohio.
A separate exhibit to the same filing declares a quarterly dividend of 9 cents a share, payable on 16 September to holders of record on 19 August. The conference call is set for Tuesday at 11 a.m. Eastern.
