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KTKTOS

Kratos Defense & Security Solutions, Inc.

$KTOS·$11B·Aerospace & Defense·Industrials
$50.98-2.0%YTD-32.2%1Y-22.9%
Mentions · last 7 days
2026-08-22: 31 posts2026-08-23: 23 posts350+1%
Price updated 9h ago·X counts updated 8d ago
KTKTOS
$KTOSKratos Defense & Security Solutions, Inc.
$50.98-1.96%350 posts+1%
AI analysisFundamentalsVoices on X
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AI verdict & sentimentAI analysisGenerated by AI from underlying data

Top X posts

Today's AI verdict on what's driving $KTOS, plus how loud the X conversation is and which way it's leaning.

AI analysis

TickerTalks’ read on the fundamentals and what’s driving the move.

Driven by hypeSelling offAI verdict · as of 2026-08-31

Falling on heavy selling — points lower unless it turns around.

The defense-drone momentum name at 10% of its 52-week range — a JDAM engine win landing while CEO DeMarco cashes $19M and the tape breaks 28% below the 200-day.

Kratos Defense makes military drones (unmanned systems), space and satellite communications, propulsion (turbojet engines), and directed-energy (laser) systems — a real defense-tech growth story that has been one of 2026's biggest large-cap losers. The equity is down 32% year-to-date and sits in the bottom 10% of its 52-week range.

  • Revenue growth is holding: Q1 revenue grew 22.6% year-over-year to $371M, prior quarters ran 17-26%, and the last four EPS prints beat consensus by 12-51% — the operating story hasn't broken, only the tape has.
  • The specific product wins are real: Kratos was awarded a Boeing JDAM Long-Range Spartan J85 engine allocation (Aug 24), and the TDI-J85 selection plus counter-drone laser demand and the SDA/MACH-TB funding refocus on China's hypersonic glide vehicles all support the FY27 $2.16B revenue outlook.
  • Insider selling is what's really moving the tape: CEO Eric DeMarco's $19.3M sale on Aug 14, director Scot Jarvis's $635K on Aug 20, plus multiple officer sales adding another $2M in the same window — that's ~$22M of insider selling in two weeks against a $11.4B market cap; the tape is voting on the tell.
  • The valuation is what makes this fragile: at 352x trailing earnings and 7.8x sales, Kratos was priced for the accelerating FY26 and FY27 EPS trajectories ($0.76 → $1.07 → $1.39) — the insider cluster suggests management sees the price above where the business earns even that projection right now.

The path if the setup restarts is a Nov 3 Q3 print confirming the beat cadence with an incremental large program-win announcement — the tape starts to absorb the insider supply and the drawdown gets bought. What confirms the breakdown is another quarter of insider selling without a specific programmatic catalyst; that's when a stock 28% below its 200-day extends to the $40 range where the P/S multiple starts matching real earnings power.

Agrees with X sentimentThe bullish X take — Kratos allocating Spartan engine capacity to Boeing's JDAM Long-Range program, TDI-J85 selection, counter-drone laser demand, China's air-launched hypersonic glide vehicle refocusing SDA and MACH-TB funding, and buy-side targets around $106 — captures the specific catalysts driving the accumulate-the-dip thesis; the honest bear count on the P/S multiple being double a fair estimate and the recent insider selling cluster ($22M+ in two weeks) is exactly what the breaking-down trajectory reflects.

What to watch: The Nov 3 Q3 print — beat cadence continuing with an incremental large program-win announcement is what starts absorbing the insider supply; another quarter of insider selling without a specific programmatic catalyst is what extends the breakdown toward the $40 range.

On the calendar: 2026-11-03 — Q3 2026 earnings

X sentiment

What the X crowd is saying right now — descriptive, summarised from the day’s posts.

Bullish sentiment28 posts analyzed · as of 2026-08-31

Kratos sentiment is loudly bullish despite a rough tape, with traders framing the pullback as a defense-supercycle buying window and posting $106 price targets. The Boeing JDAM Long Range allocation of Spartan/J85 engines lands as central: CEO DeMarco flagged it as potentially "one of the largest single opportunities for our company." Bears note P/S looks stretched and drone stocks are down 60%+ off highs; bulls counter with CCAs, hypersonics, and directed-energy tailwinds.

Read the AI verdict + X sentiment for $KTOS

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What it does

Plain-English summary of the business — what they sell and how they make money.

Makes affordable unmanned aerial systems, satellite ground equipment, and microwave electronics for US military.

Industry overviewAI analysisGenerated by AI from underlying data

Where Aerospace & Defense sits in its cycle right now — and what that implies for $KTOS.

Aerospace & Defense · Industrials

Defense budget tailwinds — NATO spending commitments and Pentagon procurement acceleration — support backlogs at prime contractors. Commercial space is a separate driver: launch cadence and satellite constellations are pulling RKLB and LUNR on their own momentum, independent of traditional defense spending.

What this means for $KTOS

Partial — REIT cash flows tied to occupancy, rent growth, and cap rate environment; Kratos Defense & Security Solutions, Inc.

Top industry ETF

$ITAiShares U.S. Aerospace & Defense ETF
+16.3%YTD
+15.0%1Y

Fundamentals & catalyst

Profitability, valuation, and the next earnings event — at a glance, with rule-of-thumb signals.

Key ratios

P/E
351.9How much investors are paying per dollar of profit the company actually earned in the last 12 months. Lower means the stock looks cheaper relative to earnings.~15–25 is typical for the S&P 500; high-growth names trade 30+; hyper-growth or speculative can be 100+ or negative.
ROIC
0.6%What percentage return the business earns on every dollar of capital (equity + debt) deployed in operations. The cleanest measure of business quality.Above ~15% is high-quality; consistently above 25% suggests a real moat. Below the company's cost of capital is value-destroying.
Op margin
2.0%Operating profit (after sales, marketing, R&D, and overhead but before interest and taxes) as a percentage of revenue. The clearest view of how well the underlying business is run.Mature business above 20% is healthy; software businesses can run 30%+; commodity / retail businesses operate in single digits.
FCF yield
-1.2%Free cash flow (operating cash flow minus capex) divided by the company's market cap. The cash-on-cash return you'd get owning the whole business at today's price.Above ~5% is attractive; below ~2% means you're paying up for growth. Capital-light businesses (software) run higher than capital-heavy ones (utilities).
P/S
7.8Same idea as P/E but per dollar of revenue. Useful for companies that aren't profitable yet, where P/E is meaningless.Under ~2 is cheap; software / SaaS often runs 8–15; well above 20 implies the market is pricing in very high future growth.
ROE
1.3%Net income as a percentage of shareholders' equity. Similar to ROIC but counts only the equity side.Above 20% is strong, but can be inflated by leverage — a heavily indebted company can show high ROE with weak underlying ROIC.
Gross margin
21.8%Revenue minus the direct cost of producing what was sold, as a percentage of revenue. The first read on whether the product is structurally profitable.Software / SaaS is typically 70%+; consumer goods 30–50%; commodity / hardware businesses can be under 20%.
D/E
0.1Total debt divided by shareholders' equity. Measures how much the business runs on borrowed money versus owner capital.Under 1 is conservative; 1–2 is typical for mature businesses; over 2 is leveraged and more sensitive to interest rates.

Past earnings

QuarterReportedActualEstimateSurprise
Q2 2026Aug 4, 2026$0.21$0.14+51.3%
Q1 2026May 6, 2026$0.16$0.13+19.2%
Q4 2025Feb 23, 2026$0.18$0.16+14.0%
Q3 2025Nov 4, 2025$0.14$0.13+12.0%
Next earningsTue, Nov 3·consensus EPS $0.21

Quarterly trend

QuarterRevenueYoYGrossOpEPSFCF
Q1 FY26$371.0M+22.6%22.6%2.1%$0.07$-48.4M
Q4 FY25$345.1M+21.9%21.4%3.0%$0.03$-12.1M
Q3 FY25$347.6M+26.0%22.2%2.0%$0.05$-41.3M
Q2 FY25$351.5M+17.1%21.0%1.1%$0.02$-32.2M

Forward consensus

5-year forecast · up to 13 analysts
FYRevenueRangeEPSRangeAnalysts
FY26$1.7B$1.7B – $1.8B$0.76$0.59 – $0.8913
FY27$2.2B$2.0B – $2.4B$1.07$0.85 – $1.3413
FY28$2.6B$2.3B – $3.0B$1.39$1.04 – $2.0110
FY29$3.0B$2.8B – $3.3B$2.08$1.94 – $2.368
FY30$3.4B$3.3B – $3.8B$2.46$2.30 – $2.798

Setup & momentum

Volume, range, and moving-average position — the technical setup driving short-term moves.

Right now

Vol vs 30dToday's traded share volume divided by the average over the prior 30 trading days. ≥3× signals unusual interest; below 1× is quiet.0.6×Today's traded share volume divided by the average over the prior 30 trading days. ≥3× signals unusual interest; below 1× is quiet.
52w rangeWhere the latest close sits between the 52-week low (0%) and high (100%). Above 80% is extended; below 30% is basing or in a downtrend.9%Where the latest close sits between the 52-week low (0%) and high (100%). Above 80% is extended; below 30% is basing or in a downtrend.
vs 50d MALatest close vs the 50-day simple moving average. Positive = short-term trend is up.-2.7%Latest close vs the 50-day simple moving average. Positive = short-term trend is up.
vs 200d MALatest close vs the 200-day simple moving average. Positive = long-term trend is up.-29.3%Latest close vs the 200-day simple moving average. Positive = long-term trend is up.

Float & profile

FloatMid float · 184.8M shFree-float shares — the slice of issued stock actually available to trade. Lower buckets squeeze harder on a catalyst.Traded today1.2% of floatToday's volume as a percent of the free float. Above 5% on a single day is unusually high turnover for the available share count.β1.115-year weekly beta vs the S&P 500. Above 1.5 means the stock typically moves more than the index; below 0.8 moves less.

Insider activity

Recent open-market buys and sells by officers and directors — flagged when multiple insiders cluster.

Recent transactions

SellAug 24Steven S. FendleyPresident7.0K sh$393KSellAug 18Scot B JarvisDirector10.0K sh$635KSellAug 17Phillip D CarraiPresident26.5K sh$1.7MSellAug 17Marie MendozaSVP & General Counsel1.5K sh$97KSellAug 14Eric M DemarcoCEO300.0K sh$19.3MSellAug 5David M CarterPresident4.0K sh$224KSellAug 3Deanna H LundCFO5.0K sh$243KSellJul 27Steven S. FendleyPresident7.0K sh$330KSellJul 15Marie MendozaSVP & General Counsel1.0K sh$52KSellJul 15Phillip D CarraiPresident6.5K sh$329K
1–10 of 40
+ 9 other (7 awards · 2 exempts) in window

See when $KTOS insiders are putting their own money in

  • Real-time open-market buys and sells from Form 4 filings
  • Cluster-buy detection when multiple insiders pile in at once
  • 30 / 60 / 180-day windows so you can spot building conviction
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SEC filings

Material 8-K, 13D, S-3, and 424B5 events from the last 180 days — the filings that actually move the price.

Recent material filings

8-KShareholder voteMay 158-K — Item 5.07: Shareholder vote
AI summary

KTOS held its Annual Meeting of stockholders around 2026-05-15 (8-K Item 5.07). Stockholders elected 9 directors to the board. Independent auditor ratification was approved. Routine governance event — monitor for unusually high withhold votes as an activist signal.

3New insider — initial holdingsMar 303
AI summary

Form filed by More than One Reporting Person Table I - Non-De filed a Form 3 (initial ownership statement) for KTOS on 2026-03-30, initiating required Section 16 reporting. Role: of Reporting Person. Form 3 is a mandatory administrative filing upon first becoming an insider or 10%+ holder; it does not reflect a purchase or sale event.

8-KOfficer or director changeMar 258-K — Item 5.02: Officer or director change
AI summary

KTOS disclosed a personnel change (8-K Item 5.02, dated 2026-03-25). An executive departure and a new appointment are both reported. Governance Committee, the Board of Director. Personnel changes are generally administrative; materiality depends on seniority and circumstances.

8-KAcquisition completedMar 68-K — Item 2.01: Acquisition completed
+ 14 other (4 13Gs · 2 10-Qs · 2 earnings 8-Ks · 2 proxys) in window

Recent news

Latest headlines from major outlets, sourced and timestamped — context for whatever just moved.

Kratos Receives $35 Million National Security Related Military-Grade Hardware Production Program Awardglobenewswire.com·23h agoKratos Defense vs. Elbit Systems: Which One Is the Better Defense Bet?zacks.com·5d agoBank of New York Mellon Corp Invests $65.29 Million in Kratos Defense & Security Solutions, Inc. $KTOSdefenseworld.net·5d ago1,077,941 Shares in Kratos Defense & Security Solutions, Inc. $KTOS Purchased by Bamco Inc. NYdefenseworld.net·5d agoDrone Stocks Slide as Risk Appetite Fades: Unusual Machines Tumbles 9%, Red Cat Falls 7%, Ondas Declines 5%247wallst.com·8d ago

In themes

Explore the broader themes this ticker is being talked about under.

Space EconomyDefense & Drones

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Voices on X · top 15 · last 7 days

TickerTalks is a research tool, not financial advice. We surface social-attention data; we do not make stock recommendations. Past attention is not predictive of future price movements.

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