Altera Corp. (ALTR) saw a jump in earnings during the second quarter, up 43% year-over-year and a major electronics company has recently announced that it will be using Altera devices in its new family of HD cameras.
Company Description
Altera develops programmable logic solutions for system and semiconductor companies. The company provides its customers with software, support, and programmable logic devices. It has offices around the world and carries a market cap of $6.5 billion.
Panasonic to Use Altera Component
On July 28th Panasonic announced it will use Altera's Cyclone III FPGAs in a new line of tapeless, high-definition cameras used for broadcasting. Panasonic chose the Altera device based on its superior video processing, low power consumption, and ease of design. The component will allow the camera to hit the market sooner and cheaper than expected.
Earnings Jump 43% in Second Quarter
Altera reported its second-quarter results on July 15th, which included a year-over-year earnings increase of 43%. The company earned 32 cents per share last quarter, topping analyst estimates of 27 cents. The second-quarter announcement was the company's third consecutive surprise, averaging 19.8% per surprise.
The current-year and next-quarter consensus earnings estimates are $1.19 and 30 cents per share, respectively. Both figures are up more than 10% in the past month.
Altera Buying Outstanding Shares
The company completed its 15.5 million share, $275 million repurchase plan in the first quarter. Since then, it has continued to repurchase approximately 600,000 more shares, totaling just over 16 million or half of the shares authorized for repurchase by the Board of Directors.
Excellent Profit Margins
Altera has a net profit margin of 35.2% and a return on equity of 23.7%; both are more than four times higher than the industry average. The company holds a Zacks Rank of #1 and is the top rated company in the Semiconductor industry on Zacks.com.
The Chart
Shares of Altera have decisively broken out of a downward trend and seem to be establishing a new level of support around $21. Take a look at the chart below.
