Garmin Turnaround May Be Complete as Earnings and Outlook Soar

Revenues rose by 79% in the company’s fitness segment in the quarter and are up 60% in the first half of the year. Auto and mobile sales are still more than double sales in fitness, but revenue growth was just 2% for the quarter and fell 1% year-over-year in the first half of 2014.

Fitness has now passed both the company’s outdoor and aviation segments. Outdoor segment sales now trail aviation for the first half of 2014, and aviation sales are up 15% year-over-year, compared with a rise of 4% in outdoor segment sales.

As promised, Garmin updated and upgraded its guidance. EPS guidance has been raised from a prior range of $2.50 to $2.60 to a new range of $2.95 to $3.05. Full-year revenue guidance has been raised from a prior range of $2.6 billion to $2.7 billion to a new range of $2.75 billion to $2.85 billion. Overall gross margins had been forecast at 54% to 55%, and Garmin raised that to 56%, while operating margin was raised from a previous estimate 21% to 24%.

The company also said that its board of directors has approved an internal restructuring to move certain U.S. subsidiaries “out from under our Taiwanese subsidiary.” Garmin said that the change “will provide access to historical earnings that were previously permanently reinvested and will allow us to efficiently repatriate future earnings to fund dividends, share repurchases, and acquisitions.” The company will pay a one-time total of $300 million over the next year for the right to restructure and gain access to the historical earnings.

The company’s CEO said:

We are excited to see the positive consumer reception for many of our recently introduced products and are maintaining our focus on innovation and diversification to drive further growth opportunities.

Garmin raised its yearly dividend from $1.80 to $1.92 beginning with the second quarter, and it now pays a dividend yield of 3.2%.

Garmin’s shares were up nearly 7%, at $61.56 in a 52-week range of $37.65 to $62.05. Thomson Reuters had a consensus analyst price target of around $59.60 before the report. Year to date, Garmin’s stock price is up about 28%, and for the trailing 12 months the shares are up nearly 55%.

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