PHOTRONICS, INC.
PLAB · Technology · $1.7B mkt cap · FY2025 filings · Shallow moat ·
On the watchlist
The four filters
Median gross margin 24.9% over 10y, variable.
Median ROIC 11.6%, above the 9% hurdle in 70% of years.
Net cash position — no leverage risk.
Owner earnings +7.1%/yr, share count shrinking (buybacks).
Margin of safety
- Owner earnings (normalized)
- $125.5M
- Est. intrinsic value / share
- $39.19
- Recent price
- $28.85
- Discount to value
- 26% below value
Conservative model: 9% discount rate, 4% assumed growth (capped at 4%), maintenance capex ≈ min(capex, D&A).
18 years of fundamentals
The business, in plain English
PHOTRONICS, INC. booked $849.3M of revenue in FY2025 in the Technology sector and kept 35.3% of it as gross profit — a solid-margin business by that measure. After every other cost, 16.1% of each revenue dollar reached the bottom line.
Across the filed record, revenue grew from $361.4M (FY2009) to $849.3M (FY2025) — about 5.5% a year compounded over 16 years.
It earned 26.2% on invested capital in FY2025, with a median of 10.2% across 17 filed years. The Returns on Capital filter above scores it 53/100.
The balance sheet carried $24000 of total debt in FY2025 against $136.4M of owner earnings — roughly 0.0 years of owner earnings to retire it all. Balance-Sheet Safety scores it 100/100.
The share count rose 7.2% between FY2010 and FY2025 — existing owners have been diluted over the record. Capital Discipline scores it 83/100.
Put together: Balance-Sheet Safety is the strongest of the four filters (100/100) and Pricing Power the weakest (21/100), which is how PLAB lands at 59/100 — a Shallow moat.
This breakdown is generated from the filed numbers and sub-scores above — no outside narrative, no estimates. Where a filing doesn’t disclose an input, the sentence that would need it is omitted instead of guessed.
Gaps in a line mean that item isn’t in PLAB’s filings for that year — the series is never interpolated or estimated. The Table view lists every filed value, including operating and net margins, total debt, and share count.
Moat Score history
Score history begins Jul 17, 2026 — the record builds from here and can’t be backfilled.
Tier changesSame-methodology crossings of the Wide / Narrow / Shallow bars
None yet — PLAB has read Shallow moat for every logged capture since Jul 17, 2026.
Scores are logged append-only and never overwritten — this record can’t be backfilled, which is exactly why it’s worth keeping.
Technology context
#135 of 532 scored Technology companies, ranked by Moat Score.
Nearest peers by Moat Score
- #133IPGP IPG PHOTONICS CORP59.0 out of 100, Shallow moatShallow moat
- #134LSCC Lattice Semiconductor Corp58.9 out of 100, Shallow moatShallow moat
- #136FRSH Freshworks Inc.58.7 out of 100, Shallow moatShallow moat
- #137PATH UiPath, Inc.58.7 out of 100, Shallow moatShallow moat
Compare PLAB with its nearest peers →All Technology companies on the Index →
Common questions about PLAB
- Does PHOTRONICS, INC. have an economic moat?
- Based on its FY2025 SEC filings, the Moat Index scores PHOTRONICS, INC. (PLAB) 58.8 out of 100 — a Shallow moat. The four filters behind that score (each 0–100): pricing power 21, returns on capital 53, balance-sheet safety 100, capital discipline 83.
- Is PLAB stock trading below its intrinsic value?
- Against a deliberately conservative owner-earnings model (9% discount rate, 4% assumed growth, capped at 4%), estimated intrinsic value is $39.19 per share versus a recent price of $28.85 — 26% below value. This is an educational estimate computed from primary SEC filings, not investment advice.
- How has PLAB's Moat Score changed over time?
- The record logs 3 readings since Jul 17, 2026; the latest reads 58.8 out of 100 (shallow moat). No tier changes on record yet. The history is append-only — readings are only ever added, never rewritten.