How to buy Photronics stock | $11.11

Photronics, Inc is a semiconductor equipment & materials business based in the US. Photronics shares (PLAB) are listed on the NASDAQ and all prices are listed in US Dollars. Photronics employs 1,775 staff and has a trailing 12-month revenue of around USD$616.7 million.

How to buy shares in Photronics

1. Compare share trading platforms. If you're a beginner, look for a platform with low commissions, expert ratings and investment tools to track your portfolio. Narrow down top brands with our comparison table.
2. Open and fund your brokerage account. Complete an application with your personal and financial details, like your ID and bank information. Fund your account with a bank transfer, credit card or debit card.
3. Search for Photronics. Find the stock by name or ticker symbol: PLAB. Research its history to confirm it's a solid investment against your financial goals.
4. Purchase now or later. Buy today with a market order or use a limit order to delay your purchase until Photronics reaches your desired price. To spread out your purchase, look into dollar-cost averaging, which smooths out buying at consistent intervals and amounts.
5. Decide on how many to buy. At last close price of USD$11.11, weigh your budget against a diversified portfolio that can minimize risk through the market's ups and downs. You may be able to buy a fractional share of Photronics, depending on your broker.
6. Check in on your investment. Congratulations, you own a part of Photronics. Optimize your portfolio by tracking how your stock — and even the business — performs with an eye on the long term. You may be eligible for dividends and shareholder voting rights on directors and management that can affect your stock.

Photronics share price

Use our graph to track the performance of PLAB stocks over time.

Photronics shares at a glance

• Key figures

Information last updated 2020-12-03.

Latest market close	USD$11.11
52-week range	USD$8.31 - USD$16.75
50-day moving average	USD$10.7846
200-day moving average	USD$10.9917
Wall St. target price	USD$15.67
PE ratio	21.5044
Dividend yield	N/A (0%)
Earnings per share (TTM)	USD$0.565

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Is it a good time to buy Photronics stock?

The technical analysis gauge below displays real-time ratings for the timeframes you select. This is not a recommendation, however. It represents a technical analysis based on the most popular technical indicators: Moving Averages, Oscillators and Pivots. Finder might not concur and takes no responsibility.

Technical Analysis of Photronics, Inc by TradingView

This chart is not advice or a guarantee of success. Rather, it gauges the real-time recommendations of three popular technical indicators: moving averages, oscillators and pivots. Finder is not responsible for how your stock performs.

Photronics price performance over time

Historical closes compared with the close of $11.11 from 2020-12-09

1 week (2021-01-13)	N/A
1 month (2020-12-24)	0.73%
3 months (2020-10-20)	N/A
6 months (2020-07-20)	N/A

1 year (2020-01-20)	N/A
2 years (2019-01-20)	N/A
3 years (2018-01-20)	N/A
5 years (2016-01-20)	N/A

Is Photronics under- or over-valued?

Valuing Photronics stock is incredibly difficult, and any metric has to be viewed as part of a bigger picture of Photronics's overall performance. However, analysts commonly use some key metrics to help gauge the value of a stock.

Photronics's P/E ratio

Photronics's current share price divided by its per-share earnings (EPS) over a 12-month period gives a "trailing price/earnings ratio" of roughly 22x. In other words, Photronics shares trade at around 22x recent earnings.

That's relatively low compared to, say, the trailing 12-month P/E ratio for the NASDAQ 100 at the end of 2019 (27.29). The low P/E ratio could mean that investors are pessimistic about the outlook for the shares or simply that they're under-valued.

Photronics's PEG ratio

Photronics's "price/earnings-to-growth ratio" can be calculated by dividing its P/E ratio by its growth – to give 4.27. A low ratio can be interpreted as meaning the shares offer better value, while a higher ratio can be interpreted as meaning the shares offer worse value.

The PEG ratio provides a broader view than just the P/E ratio, as it gives more insight into Photronics's future profitability. By accounting for growth, it could also help you if you're comparing the share prices of multiple high-growth companies.

Photronics's EBITDA

Photronics's EBITDA (earnings before interest, taxes, depreciation and amortisation) is USD$165 million.

The EBITDA is a measure of a Photronics's overall financial performance and is widely used to measure a its profitability.

Photronics financials

Revenue TTM	USD$616.7 million
Operating margin TTM	11.42%
Gross profit TTM	USD$120.8 million
Return on assets TTM	3.81%
Return on equity TTM	4.82%
Profit margin	6.01%
Book value	$12.193
Market capitalisation	USD$797.8 million

TTM: trailing 12 months

Shorting Photronics shares

There are currently 1.1 million Photronics shares held short by investors – that's known as Photronics's "short interest". This figure is 35.5% down from 1.7 million last month.

There are a few different ways that this level of interest in shorting Photronics shares can be evaluated.

Photronics's "short interest ratio" (SIR)

Photronics's "short interest ratio" (SIR) is the quantity of Photronics shares currently shorted divided by the average quantity of Photronics shares traded daily (recently around 333399.40652819). Photronics's SIR currently stands at 3.37. In other words for every 100,000 Photronics shares traded daily on the market, roughly 3370 shares are currently held short.

However Photronics's short interest can also be evaluated against the total number of Photronics shares, or, against the total number of tradable Photronics shares (the shares that aren't held by "insiders" or major long-term shareholders – also known as the "float"). In this case Photronics's short interest could be expressed as 0.02% of the outstanding shares (for every 100,000 Photronics shares in existence, roughly 20 shares are currently held short) or 0.0209% of the tradable shares (for every 100,000 tradable Photronics shares, roughly 21 shares are currently held short).

Such a low SIR usually points to an optimistic outlook for the share price, with fewer people currently willing to bet against Photronics.

Find out more about how you can short Photronics stock.

Photronics share dividends

We're not expecting Photronics to pay a dividend over the next 12 months.

Have Photronics's shares ever split?

Photronics's shares were split on a 2:1 basis on 2 December 1997. So if you had owned 1 share the day before before the split, the next day you'd have owned 2 shares. This wouldn't directly have changed the overall worth of your Photronics shares – just the quantity. However, indirectly, the new 50% lower share price could have impacted the market appetite for Photronics shares which in turn could have impacted Photronics's share price.

Photronics share price volatility

Over the last 12 months, Photronics's shares have ranged in value from as little as $8.31 up to $16.75. A popular way to gauge a stock's volatility is its "beta".

Beta is a measure of a share's volatility in relation to the market. The market (NASDAQ average) beta is 1, while Photronics's is 0.8061. This would suggest that Photronics's shares are less volatile than average (for this exchange).

Photronics overview

Photronics, Inc., together with its subsidiaries, manufactures and sells photomasks in Taiwan, Korea, the United States, Europe, China, and internationally. The company offers photomasks, which are high precision photographic quartz or glass plates containing microscopic images of electronic circuits for use in the manufacture of semiconductors and flat panel displays (FPDs), as well as that are used as masters to transfer circuit patterns onto semiconductor wafers and FDP substrates during the fabrication of integrated circuits, FPDs, and other types of electrical and optical components. It sells its products to semiconductor or FPD designers, manufacturers, and foundries, as well as to other high performance electronics manufacturers through its sales personnel and customer service representatives. The company was formerly known as Photronic Labs, Inc. and changed its name to Photronics, Inc. in 1990. Photronics, Inc. was founded in 1969 and is based in Brookfield, Connecticut.

Frequently asked questions

• What percentage of Photronics is owned by insiders or institutions?

  Currently 3.323% of Photronics shares are held by insiders and 90.936% by institutions.

• How many people work for Photronics?

  Latest data suggests 1,775 work at Photronics.

• When does the fiscal year end for Photronics?

  Photronics's fiscal year ends in October.

• Where is Photronics based?

  Photronics's address is: 15 Secor Road, Brookfield, CT, United States, 06804

• What is Photronics's ISIN number?

  Photronics's international securities identification number is: US7194051022

• What is Photronics's CUSIP number?

  Photronics's Committee on Uniform Securities Identification Procedures number is: 719405102