One-glance verdict
Overvalued
$81.80 our estimate vs market $148.88
Wall Street consensus: $162.20 (98.3% higher than our fair-value estimate)
82% above our estimate, beyond the bull case
Fundamentals snapshot
Lamar Advertising Company
LAMR · NMS · Real Estate · REIT - Specialty
Current price
$148.88
52-week range
$114.45 - $166.33
Market cap
$15.12B
Balance sheet
Distressed
4.35x Stretched
Net debt $4.91B. Interest coverage shows how many times profit covers the interest bill.
What stands out
3 Rewards
3 Risks
3 rewards · 3 risks
- Reward Revenue grew 3.7% last year.
- Reward Returns 59.4% on equity, ahead of 50% of its peers.
- Risk Insider ownership is only 0.8% (peer median: 11.0%).
- Risk Stock trades 8.3% above its 5-year average P/E.
What this company does
Lamar Advertising Company
Lamar Advertising owns the physical billboards and digital signs you see along highways and in cities across the United States and Canada. The company makes money by renting this ad space to all kinds of businesses, from local shops to big national brands, essentially acting as a landlord for real-world advertising. This is important because Lamar owns the valuable physical locations that companies need to reach customers who are on the go.
How the company got here
Lamar Advertising's story begins in 1902 with a poster company in Pensacola, Florida, that was acquired by its founder, Charles W. Lamar, in a coin toss. The company shifted its focus to roadside billboards in the 1920s as the number of paved roads grew. Over the decades, Lamar expanded by acquiring smaller advertising companies across the United States. In 1996, the company became publicly traded on the NASDAQ stock exchange, which allowed it to raise money from investors to fuel further growth. A significant change occurred in 2014 when Lamar restructured as a Real Estate Investment Trust (REIT), a type of company that primarily owns and operates income-producing real estate.
What it actually does
Lamar Advertising is in the business of outdoor advertising, which you might know as "out-of-home" advertising. Think of the billboards you see along the highway – Lamar owns a vast network of these, both traditional printed ones and modern digital screens. They rent this space to a wide range of customers, from local businesses to large national brands, who want to reach people when they are out and about. Beyond just billboards, Lamar also manages advertising on public transit like buses and in airports.
Billboards
This is Lamar's largest and most important business, making up the vast majority of its revenue. The company owns and operates a massive network of traditional, static billboards as well as a growing number of digital billboards across the United States and Canada. Local businesses and national brands pay Lamar to display their advertisements on these billboards, which are strategically placed along high-traffic roads and highways. The digital billboards are a particularly fast-growing area, as they allow multiple advertisers to rotate their messages on a single screen.
Transit & Airport
This part of the business focuses on placing advertisements in and on public transportation systems and in airports. This includes ads you might see on the sides of buses, at bus shelters, on benches, and inside airport terminals. Companies pay Lamar to place their ads in these locations to reach commuters and travelers. While this is a smaller portion of Lamar's overall business compared to billboards, it provides another way for advertisers to connect with audiences on the go.
Logo Signs
You've likely seen these signs on the highway that show the logos for gas stations, restaurants, and hotels at an upcoming exit. Lamar has contracts to produce and display these official interstate logo signs. Businesses pay to have their logos featured on these signs to attract travelers. This is a steady and reliable source of income for the company, though it represents a smaller slice of their total business than billboards.
What management is betting on now
Lamar's current strategy heavily focuses on expanding its network of digital billboards. The company is actively converting many of its traditional static billboards to digital displays because a single digital board can generate significantly more revenue by showing ads from multiple clients. They are also continuing to grow by acquiring smaller billboard companies to increase their presence in various markets. Additionally, Lamar is investing in technology to make the ad buying process more efficient and to better demonstrate the effectiveness of its advertising to clients.
Price history
How the share price has moved
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Earnings history
Last 8 quarters — what happened
Click any quarter to read the call summary and what the numbers say.
FY2024 Q3
$197.25M
FY2024 Q4
$236.30M
FY2025 Q1
$97.86M
FY2025 Q2
$191.29M
FY2025 Q3
$185.81M
FY2025 Q4
$208.30M
FY2026 Q1
$114.25M
FY2026 Q2
$209.70M
Revenue
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Net income
$160.75M
Diluted EPS
1.58
Operating cash flow
$252.42M
Free cash flow
$209.70M
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Sources
Revenue
—
Net income
$101.29M
Diluted EPS
1.00
Operating cash flow
$147.39M
Free cash flow
$114.25M
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Sources
Revenue
—
Net income
$152.29M
Diluted EPS
1.50
Operating cash flow
$271.16M
Free cash flow
$208.30M
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Sources
Revenue
—
Net income
$141.75M
Diluted EPS
1.40
Operating cash flow
$235.66M
Free cash flow
$185.81M
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Sources
Revenue
—
Net income
$154.35M
Diluted EPS
1.52
Operating cash flow
$229.49M
Free cash flow
$191.29M
Fetching…
Sources
Revenue
—
Net income
$138.75M
Diluted EPS
1.35
Operating cash flow
$127.75M
Free cash flow
$97.86M
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Sources
Revenue
—
Net income
$-1.20M
Diluted EPS
-0.02
Operating cash flow
$279.31M
Free cash flow
$236.30M
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Sources
Revenue
—
Net income
$147.48M
Diluted EPS
1.44
Operating cash flow
$227.39M
Free cash flow
$197.25M
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Sources
Is it cheap or expensive?
Fair value $81.80 vs current price $148.88
Wall Street consensus is the average analyst price target: $162.20 (98.3% higher than our fair-value estimate).
Our most-likely fair value is $81.80 a share — about 45.1% below today's price of $148.88, so the stock currently looks expensive (overvalued).
Is it drowning in debt?
Distressed
Net debt $4.9B. Interest coverage 4.4x.
Net debt
$4.91B
Interest coverage
4.35x
Lamar Advertising Company's profit covers its interest bill about 4.4 times over. which is stronger than every peer shown here and 1 peers sit below 1x, which is the danger zone where profit does not fully cover the interest bill.
Distressed
Worse cushion
Baseline
Better cushion
LAMR
BASELINE
Lamar Advertising Company
Total debt $4.98B Interest coverage 4.35x This is the baseline the peer rows are being compared against.
Total debt $4.13B Interest coverage 2.13x -51% vs LAMR Carries about 2.0x less debt cushion than LAMR.
Total debt $6.47B Interest coverage 0.79x -82% vs LAMR Carries about 5.5x less debt cushion than LAMR.
What you should know
The case for and against LAMR
3 Rewards
3 Risks
Rewards
-
Revenue grew 3.7% last year.
-
Returns 59.4% on equity, ahead of 50% of its peers.
-
Free cash flow was positive in 10/10 years.
Risks
-
Insider ownership is only 0.8% (peer median: 11.0%).
-
Stock trades 8.3% above its 5-year average P/E.
-
Net debt grew 7.4% over 3 years.
The numbers
All the key metrics, grouped by purpose
Tap any ? icon to learn what it means.
Valuation
How expensive the stock looks
P/E (TTM)
27.17x
Forward P/E
22.98x
P/B
15.39x
P/S
6.50x
EV/EBITDA
19.02x
PEG ratio
2.20x
Profitability
How much profit each dollar creates
Gross margin
67.4%
Operating margin
33.3%
Net margin
23.9%
ROE
59.4%
ROA
6.6%
Health
Liquidity and balance-sheet strength
Debt / equity
5.00x
Current ratio
0.63x
Quick ratio
0.57x
Total debt
$4.98B
Total cash
$67.95M
Growth
How the business has been compounding
Revenue TTM
$1.60B
Revenue 5Y CAGR
5.5%
EPS TTM
5.48
EPS 5Y CAGR
10.2%
Cash flow
How much cash the business throws off
Operating CF TTM
$906.62M
Free CF TTM
$683.25M
FCF margin
42.8%
Dividend
Shareholder payout
Yield
4.4%
Payout ratio
115.0%
Last ex-div date
2026-09-21