KLA (KLAC)
Forward P/E is 28.76x against a peer median of 24.15x, a ratio of 1.19x — above the 1.15x overvalued threshold — with a trailing P/E of 42.95x and a price/sales ratio of 14.77x, the richest in this equipment group. The premium is not paid for by superior growth: latest-quarter revenue growth was +15.2% year over year (PRIMARY/EDGAR), below both Applied Materials' +24.8% in the same brief set and the cluster median of +24.8%, and the PEG ratio of 1.39 is higher than AMAT's 0.73. Delivered demand check: the cluster's median revenue growth was +24.8% year over year — demand rising, but KLA is growing more slowly than that median while charging more for its earnings.
What would change this label: Move to FAIRLY PRICED if the forward P/E falls below about 27.8x (1.15x the current peer median of 24.15x) at unchanged growth, or if revenue growth accelerates above +25% year over year, matching the cluster median, at the current multiple. Move further toward a stronger OVERVALUED call if the forward P/E expands above about 31.4x (1.30x the peer median) without revenue growth reaching +25% year over year.
KLA makes the inspection machines that check chips for defects while they are being made. Its sales grew about 15% over the past year — good, but slower than similar companies, whose sales grew about 25%. Despite that, its shares cost about 29 times expected profits, more than those rivals at about 24 times. You are paying a premium price without getting premium growth, so the shares look overvalued.
Both lines start at 100 on 2020-09-01. Over the full window KLA returned +638.93% and the S&P 500 +118.28% (price returns; dividends not reinvested). Worst peak-to-trough fall for KLA: -51.7% (2026-06-30 to 2026-10-23). Source: Nasdaq official daily history.
What the label rests on
Forward P/E is 28.76x against a peer median of 24.15x, a ratio of 1.19x — above the 1.15x overvalued threshold — with a trailing P/E of 42.95x and a price/sales ratio of 14.77x, the richest in this equipment group. The premium is not paid for by superior growth: latest-quarter revenue growth was +15.2% year over year (PRIMARY/EDGAR), below both Applied Materials' +24.8% in the same brief set and the cluster median of +24.8%, and the PEG ratio of 1.39 is higher than AMAT's 0.73. Delivered demand check: the cluster's median revenue growth was +24.8% year over year — demand rising, but KLA is growing more slowly than that median while charging more for its earnings. The company’s forward P/E is 28.8× against a peer median of 24.1×. Its own history: UNVERIFIED — no sourced range available. Sector demand read: Delivered demand check: the Semiconductor equipment & materials group's median latest-quarter revenue growth was +24.8% year over year (SEC filings) — demand rising. Latest-quarter sales growth was +15.2% versus a year earlier (SEC filings).
| Company | Price (Oct 28, 2026) | Forward P/E | Trailing P/E |
|---|---|---|---|
| KLA (KLAC) | $157.21 | 28.8× | 43.0× |
| LRCX | $248.30 | 24.1× | 37.0× |
| AMAT | $405.78 | 23.0× | 35.0× |
| TER | $323.68 | 31.2× | 37.1× |
| Q | $118.75 | — | — |
| Peer median | 24.1× |
Multiples: stockanalysis.com (SECONDARY, S&P Global data), fetched Oct 28, 2026. Peer set chosen by sector; the median is the middle value of the set. The label and its numbers were recorded in the programme’s label registry on Oct 28, 2026 and will be scored at 6 and 12 months.
Sales, profit and cash
This company does not report a gross-profit line in its SEC facts (normal for banks, payment networks and some health insurers), so profit is shown as net income instead — gross margin is marked UNVERIFIED-absent rather than estimated.
Free cash flow = cash from operations minus spending on plant and equipment, both from the company’s SEC cash-flow statement. Gaps are quarters where that spending line is not separately tagged in the filings — shown as gaps, never estimated.
| Quarter | Sales | Gross margin | Net income | EPS (GAAP, diluted) | Free cash flow |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Q/E Jun 2026 2026-06-30 | $3.7B | — | $1.4B | — | $817M |
| Q/E Mar 2026 2026-03-31 | $3.4B | — | $1.2B | 9.12 | $622M |
| Q/E Dec 2025 2025-12-31 | $3.3B | — | $1.1B | 8.68 | $1.3B |
| Q/E Sep 2025 2025-09-30 | $3.2B | — | $1.1B | 8.47 | $1.1B |
| Q/E Jun 2025 2025-06-30 | $3.2B | — | $1.2B | — | $1.1B |
| Q/E Mar 2025 2025-03-31 | $3.1B | — | $1.1B | 8.16 | $990M |
| Q/E Dec 2024 2024-12-31 | $3.1B | — | $825M | 6.16 | $757M |
| Q/E Sep 2024 2024-09-30 | $2.8B | — | $946M | 7.01 | $935M |
| Q/E Jun 2024 2024-06-30 | $2.6B | — | $836M | — | $832M |
| Q/E Mar 2024 2024-03-31 | $2.4B | — | $602M | 4.43 | $838M |
| Q/E Dec 2023 2023-12-31 | $2.5B | — | $583M | 4.28 | $545M |
| Q/E Sep 2023 2023-09-30 | $2.4B | — | $741M | 5.41 | $816M |
The last twelve reported quarters. Full 24-quarter history sits in the data pack behind this page. A dash means the figure is not tagged as a standalone quarter in the company’s SEC facts (the usual case is the fourth quarter, which many companies only report inside the full-year filing) — it is missing, not zero.
Earnings: getting better or worse?
Each box is one quarter’s earnings per share (EPS). Green means EPS was higher than the same quarter a year earlier; red means lower; a dash means the figure is not tagged in the filings.
Basis: GAAP diluted EPS from SEC company facts, compared with the same quarter a year earlier.
Key facts
| Item | Value |
|---|---|
| Company (legal name in filings) | KLA CORP |
| Chief executive | Richard Wallace (source: https://ir.kla.com/sec-filings/all-sec-filings/content/0001193125-26-397898/0001193125-26-397898.pdf) |
| Sector | Technology — Semiconductor Materials & Equipment — sells inspection and process-control equipment used to find defects in chip manufacturing |
| Share price (Oct 28, 2026) | $157.21 |
| Market value (market cap) | $200.8B — share price times shares outstanding of 1,306,546,783 (SEC filings; SEC EDGAR dei EntityCommonStockSharesOutstanding (latest)) |
| Sales, last twelve months | $13.6B |
| Net income, last twelve months | $4.8B |
| Free cash flow, last twelve months | $3.8B |
| Latest reported quarter | Q/E Jun 2026 (of 24 quarters in the data pack) |
| Six-year price return vs S&P 500 | +638.93% vs +118.28% |
| Worst peak-to-trough fall | -51.7% (2026-06-30 to 2026-10-23) |
What we could not verify
- Gross profit / gross margin: not tagged as a standalone line in this company's EDGAR company facts (common for banks, payment networks and some healthcare payers) — shown as UNVERIFIED-absent; the page charts revenue and net income instead.
- TTM GAAP diluted EPS could not be summed from company facts because at least one of the last four quarters (typically Q4) has no standalone tagged EPS; trailing P/E is therefore taken from the labelled secondary source in valuation_label.md.
- Own-history P/E range not yet compiled for this company in the Phase 1 batch run; the label rests on peer-median, growth and PEG evidence.
- Peer set in the brief contains only three peers with multiples (LRCX, AMAT, TER); the fourth listed peer, Q, has null forward and trailing P/E in the brief, so the peer median of 24.15x rests on three priced peers.
- Guidance record (each quarter scored against the guidance the company gave the quarter before) is not yet compiled for this company — it is a Phase 2 layer. The earnings strip below therefore uses reported EPS versus a year earlier, which is fully sourced from filings.
The IT factor — the most exciting thing the market is overlooking — is not assessed on an X-Ray page. It belongs to the Deep Dive (Phase 2), where it gets the evidence standard it needs. Leadership-era scoring (the six years split by chief executive) is likewise a Phase 2 layer; this page names the current chief executive only, from a sourced profile.
Sources
- SEC EDGAR submissions — Filing index; company legal name.
https://data.sec.gov/submissions/CIK0000319201.json - SEC EDGAR company facts — Quarterly financial spine: revenue, gross profit, net income, GAAP diluted EPS, operating cash flow, PP&E capex, buybacks, dividends, diluted shares.
https://data.sec.gov/api/xbrl/companyfacts/CIK0000319201.json - Nasdaq official daily history — Daily closes for the company; SPY (assetclass=etf) saved as raw/nasdaq_spy_raw.json over identical dates.
https://api.nasdaq.com/api/quote/KLAC/historical?assetclass=stocks - Valuation multiples and peer figures — stockanalysis.com (SECONDARY, S&P Global data), fetched Oct 28, 2026; see valuation_label.md in the data pack.
Conventions: earliest-filed value per period, as first reported; cash-flow years-to-date differenced quarter by quarter; EPS never differenced; free cash flow = operating cash flow minus plant-and-equipment spending. This page is a dated snapshot — updates are new versions, never silent edits.