Although we don't believe in timing the market or panicking over market movements, we do like to keep an eye on big changes -- just in case they're material to our investing thesis.
What: Shares of oil and gas service company Matrix Service Co. (MTRX -2.04%) jumped as much as 25.8% today after the company reported earnings.
So what: Fiscal second quarter revenue was up 40.5% to $311 million and earnings per share jumped from $0.21 a year ago to $0.38 last quarter. The earnings result was $0.12 better than estimates and investors cheered the quickly improving profitability.
Now what: Matrix did complete the acquisition of Kvaerner North American Construction but it had little impact on growth or earnings in the quarter. That acquisition should help increase margins and helped bring backlog up to a record of $882.6 million. The stock looks expensive at 20 times forward estimates, but given the increasing margins I think this stock still has room to run higher.
