What Happened?
Shares of crane and lifting equipment company Manitowoc (NYSE: MTW) fell 16.9% in the morning session after its second-quarter 2025 earnings report, as investors looked past a significant profit beat to focus on a top-line miss and weakening underlying metrics. While the crane manufacturer's adjusted earnings per share of $2.80 crushed analyst expectations, its revenue told a different story. Net sales fell 4% year-over-year to $539.5 million, missing consensus estimates. Investor concerns were likely amplified by other signs of weakness, including a 12.8% year-over-year decline in the company's order backlog to $729.3 million. Furthermore, adjusted EBITDA missed estimates by over 30%, and free cash flow worsened significantly to a loss of $73.7 million. These results suggested that despite the strong bottom-line number, the company faces headwinds from slowing demand and operational challenges.
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What Is The Market Telling Us
Manitowoc’s shares are very volatile and have had 26 moves greater than 5% over the last year. But moves this big are rare even for Manitowoc and indicate this news significantly impacted the market’s perception of the business.
The biggest move we wrote about over the last year was 6 months ago when the stock gained 21.9% on the news that the company reported strong fourth-quarter results that significantly exceeded analysts' EPS expectations, with EBITDA also outperforming Wall Street estimates by a wide margin. However, backlog declined notably, and revenue remained flat compared to the prior year, inline with expectations.
Looking ahead, the company remained focused on growing its non-new machine sales and expanding its aftermarket business, as highlighted by its recent distribution rights acquisition in the southeastern U.S. However, the backlog weakness raises concerns about future growth momentum. Zooming out, we think this was a decent quarter featuring some areas of strength but also some blemishes.
Manitowoc is up 21.7% since the beginning of the year, but at $10.83 per share, it is still trading 19.1% below its 52-week high of $13.39 from July 2025. Investors who bought $1,000 worth of Manitowoc’s shares 5 years ago would now be looking at an investment worth $1,054.
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