Jim Cramer says surging defense stock is a sensational buy

Forget the usual Wall Street qualifiers. Jim Cramer went straight for the superlatives on Lockheed Martin (LMT).

During the August 6 episode of CNBC’s Mad Money Lightning Round, he called the stock “sensational” and its CEO “fantastic.” Two words that leave little doubt about where he stands.

I think it’s sensational. I think the CEO is fantastic.

Having tracked defense stocks through the Morgan Stanley National Security Innovation Summit and the broader reshoring thesis, I find myself agreeing with Cramer.

The numbers behind Lockheed right now aren’t just good. They’re historic. And the contract pipeline suggests the best may still be ahead.

Also Read: Lockheed Martin Corporation News Latest News and Stories

Why Lockheed Martin’s Q2 results were a genuine turning point

Let me put the year-over-year comparison in plain terms. In Q2 2025, Lockheed reported $342 million in net earnings, dragged down by $1.6 billion in program losses. In Q2 2026, net earnings reached $1.836 billion, according to Lockheed Martin‘s earnings statement.

To me, that’s not even a beat but a massive transformation.

Lockheed Martin’s key Q2 2026 numbers:

Net sales of $20.1 billion, up 11% year-over-year (YoY)
Diluted earnings per share (EPS) of $7.94, up from $1.46 in Q2 2025
Free cash flow of $2.9 billion, compared to negative $150 million a year ago
Business segment operating profit up 279% YoY to $2.162 billion
Source: Lockheed Martin Second Quarter 2026 Financial Results

The segment driving most of the excitement is Missiles and Fire Control, which posted sales of $4.1 billion, up 19% YoY, with operating profit up 24% YoY, according to Lockheed’s statement.

PAC-3, THAAD, and precision strike missile production ramps are all accelerating simultaneously. In fact, that’s a combination that has rarely happened in defense history.

I analyzed the backlog figure and had to look twice. Lockheed ended Q2 with a record $230.4 billion in backlog, up from $193.6 billion at year-end 2025, driven by $65 billion in new orders during the quarter alone, according to Lockheed’s statement.

That’s honestly incredible. That backlog represents roughly three years of revenue at the current run rate. Visibility doesn’t get much clearer than that.

No wonder Jim Taiclet was so confident when he mentioned the current defense climate as a “golden opportunity” for the company in my prior coverage.

The contracts that explain why Cramer is so bullish on LMT right now

Of course, the backlog didn’t build itself. Three contract awards, in particular, tell the story of where global defense spending is flowing.

In July 2026, Lockheed received a seven-year contract modification worth up to $53.86 billion to accelerate production of PAC-3 Missile Segment Enhancement interceptors, according to a Lockheed statement.
In June, it secured a procurement contract worth up to $35 billion for Terminal High Altitude Area Defense (THAAD) interceptors.
And earlier this year, it won a $1.9 billion extension for the C-130J training program, covering the U.S. Navy Reserve and Coast Guard.

That’s over $90 billion in contract awards across two missile programs in a short span of a few weeks. Not to mention several others worth hundreds of millions that I covered sometimes back.

The geopolitical backdrop driving that demand — rising tensions across multiple theaters, NATO allies accelerating their own defense buildouts, and a U.S. government focused on domestic missile production — isn’t going away anytime soon.

Lockheed is also backing its contract wins with capital. Lockheed announced a sweeping $8 billion to $9 billion investment plan through 2030 to modernize and expand more than 20 manufacturing facilities across the United States, with new facilities breaking ground in Camden, Arkansas, and Troy, Alabama.

A partnership with GM Defense adds General Motors’ commercial manufacturing scale to Lockheed’s defense expertise. That’s a combination designed to compress production timelines in ways the traditional defense industrial base has struggled to achieve.

In Q2 2025, Lockheed reported $342 million in net earnings. In Q2 2026, net earnings skyrocketed to $1.836 billion.

Tom Brenner/Bloomberg via Getty Images

What Wall Street thinks and why the raised guidance matters

JPMorgan’s price target is at $620, according to an MT Newswires report. None of the major firms have issued a strong buy. Most are neutral to market performance. To me, that means the institutional enthusiasm hasn’t fully caught up to the operational momentum yet.

And that gap between analyst caution and business performance is exactly the kind of setup that tends to resolve in favor of the fundamentals over time.

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Lockheed raised its full-year 2026 EPS guidance to $29.95 – $30.65, up from its prior range, according to its statement. Full-year free cash flow guidance was lifted to $7.0 billion to $7.2 billion, from a prior range of $6.5 billion to $6.8 billion. Net sales are now projected between $79.75 billion and $81.75 billion, representing approximately 8% YoY growth.

As of this report, LMT shares are up 21.12% year-to-date and 38.03% over the past year, according to Yahoo Finance data. The S&P 500 returned 12.92% and 21.93% over those same periods.

Cramer called CEO Jim Taiclet fantastic. My read on the numbers says that all of this is earned. A record backlog, transformational earnings recovery, billions in recent contract awards, and raised guidance across every meaningful metric.

Lockheed Martin now looks like one of the clearest fundamental stories on the board, to be honest.