Safety equipment manufacturer MSA Safety (NYSE: MSA) beat Wall Street’s revenue expectations in Q4 CY2025, with sales up 2.2% year on year to $510.9 million. Its non-GAAP profit of $2.38 per share was 5.3% above analysts’ consensus estimates.
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MSA Safety (MSA) Q4 CY2025 Highlights:
- Revenue: $510.9 million vs analyst estimates of $507.5 million (2.2% year-on-year growth, 0.7% beat)
- Adjusted EPS: $2.38 vs analyst estimates of $2.26 (5.3% beat)
- Adjusted EBITDA: $136 million vs analyst estimates of $131.3 million (26.6% margin, 3.6% beat)
- Operating Margin: 22.3%, down from 24.5% in the same quarter last year
- Free Cash Flow Margin: 20.8%, up from 18.7% in the same quarter last year
- Market Capitalization: $7.62 billion
Company Overview
Founded in 1914 as Mine Safety Appliances to protect coal miners from dangerous gases, MSA Safety (NYSE: MSA) designs and manufactures advanced safety products that protect workers and facilities across industries including fire service, energy, construction, and manufacturing.
Revenue Growth
A company’s long-term sales performance is one signal of its overall quality. Any business can put up a good quarter or two, but many enduring ones grow for years.
With $1.87 billion in revenue over the past 12 months, MSA Safety is a mid-sized business services company, which sometimes brings disadvantages compared to larger competitors benefiting from better economies of scale. On the bright side, it can still flex high growth rates because it’s working from a smaller revenue base.
As you can see below, MSA Safety grew its sales at a decent 6.8% compounded annual growth rate over the last five years. This shows its offerings generated slightly more demand than the average business services company, a useful starting point for our analysis.
We at StockStory place the most emphasis on long-term growth, but within business services, a half-decade historical view may miss recent innovations or disruptive industry trends. MSA Safety’s recent performance shows its demand has slowed as its annualized revenue growth of 2.4% over the last two years was below its five-year trend. We’re wary when companies in the sector see decelerations in revenue growth, as it could signal changing consumer tastes aided by low switching costs. 
This quarter, MSA Safety reported modest year-on-year revenue growth of 2.2% but beat Wall Street’s estimates by 0.7%.
Looking ahead, sell-side analysts expect revenue to grow 5.5% over the next 12 months, an improvement versus the last two years. This projection is above the sector average and suggests its newer products and services will fuel better top-line performance.
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Operating Margin
MSA Safety has been a well-oiled machine over the last five years. It demonstrated elite profitability for a business services business, boasting an average operating margin of 21.3%.
Looking at the trend in its profitability, MSA Safety’s operating margin rose by 4.2 percentage points over the last five years, as its sales growth gave it operating leverage.
In Q4, MSA Safety generated an operating margin profit margin of 22.3%, down 2.3 percentage points year on year. This contraction shows it was less efficient because its expenses grew faster than its revenue.
Earnings Per Share
Revenue trends explain a company’s historical growth, but the long-term change in earnings per share (EPS) points to the profitability of that growth – for example, a company could inflate its sales through excessive spending on advertising and promotions.
MSA Safety’s EPS grew at a remarkable 12% compounded annual growth rate over the last five years, higher than its 6.8% annualized revenue growth. This tells us the company became more profitable on a per-share basis as it expanded.
We can take a deeper look into MSA Safety’s earnings quality to better understand the drivers of its performance. As we mentioned earlier, MSA Safety’s operating margin declined this quarter but expanded by 4.2 percentage points over the last five years. This was the most relevant factor (aside from the revenue impact) behind its higher earnings; interest expenses and taxes can also affect EPS but don’t tell us as much about a company’s fundamentals.
Like with revenue, we analyze EPS over a more recent period because it can provide insight into an emerging theme or development for the business.
For MSA Safety, its two-year annual EPS growth of 6.2% was lower than its five-year trend. We hope its growth can accelerate in the future.
In Q4, MSA Safety reported adjusted EPS of $2.38, up from $2.25 in the same quarter last year. This print beat analysts’ estimates by 5.3%. Over the next 12 months, Wall Street expects MSA Safety’s full-year EPS of $7.93 to grow 9%.
Key Takeaways from MSA Safety’s Q4 Results
It was good to see MSA Safety beat analysts’ EPS expectations this quarter. We were also happy its revenue narrowly outperformed Wall Street’s estimates. Overall, this print had some key positives. The stock remained flat at $196.72 immediately following the results.
Big picture, is MSA Safety a buy here and now? We think that the latest quarter is only one piece of the longer-term business quality puzzle. Quality, when combined with valuation, can help determine if the stock is a buy. We cover that in our actionable full research report which you can read here (it’s free).
