I looked at and discussed all of the major aerospace and defense contractors after they reported third quarter earnings. Of the biggest and best companies in this sector, I thought that General Dynamics (GD) was the only one that had an attractive valuation. In both the second and third quarters, management hiked its revenue guidance. On the last conference call, the company announced that it planned to use all of its free cash flow to buy back shares and raise dividends. As a dividend growth investor, that was music to my ears. I haven’t yet pulled the trigger, but I am still very much interested in the company.
After reviewing the fourth quarter and full-year 2017 earnings release, I think that General Dynamics has a lot of growth in front of it through the end of the decade. Management laid out some aggressive guidance through 2021, which we’ll look at later, and this has me thinking that now is a very good time to buy shares of the defense contractor. Let’s begin with a look at the company’s most recent earnings results to see how the company performed and if investors should be bullish on General Dynamics. All financial information is taken directly from the company's fourth quarter earnings release.
