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Makes prestige beauty and skincare brands including Estee Lauder, Clinique, MAC and La Mer, sold mainly through department stores and travel retail.
Makes prestige beauty and skincare brands including Estee Lauder, Clinique, MAC and La Mer, sold mainly through department stores and travel retail.
Sells at wholesale to department stores, perfume shops and airport duty-free stores, as well as online and in its own shops, so shifts in travel traffic and department-store footfall show up quickly. Skincare, the higher-priced line, carries the business. The Lauder family keeps control through shares with extra votes, and the company has been running a multi-year restructuring.
Moat: narrow (brand, distribution). Prestige brand portfolio with deep travel-retail and department-store relationships, though China/travel-retail dependence is a risk.
Headquarters: New York, New York, US · Founded: 1946 · Employees: 55,000
Size Estée Lauder Companies (The) (EL) is a United States Consumer Staples company (Household/Personal Care) with a market value of $39.9B, the 299th largest of 3,117 United States companies the cockpit tracks. Shares closed at $110.06 on 6 Nov 2026.
Performance Over six months the shares gained 28.2%, against +15.8% for the median peer and -1.1% for the United States market (cap-weighted) — 4th highest of 16 in its peer set.
Growth Revenue grew 6.2% over the last twelve months (peer median +0.3%); the operating margin is 12.5% (peer median 16.1%).
Valuation It trades at 31.1× forward earnings against a peer median of 24.2× (4th most expensive of 16).
Price implies For today's price to make sense, revenue must grow about 17% a year for seven years (Req g). Recent delivered growth is -1%, so the hurdle is +18 pp: the price needs faster growth than the company has been delivering — of companies that just grew 25–50% a year, 93.8% slowed down over the next four years.
Capital Return on invested capital runs 5.2 points above its cost of capital (9.9% WACC).
Backlog Backlog (remaining performance obligations) was $779M at 30 Sep 2026 — 0.1 years of trailing revenue. Backlog detail →
Credit Estée Lauder Companies (The) has 13 bonds outstanding ($7.25B), rated A- by the agencies and trading like A at a weighted spread of 72 bp.
Short interest Short interest is 2.9% of the free float (15 Oct 2026).
Next results Next results expected around 3 Feb 2027 (exchange calendar; dates can move).
| TTM | FY2026 | FY2025 | FY2024 | FY2023 | |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Revenue | $15.3B | $15.1B | $14.3B | $15.6B | $15.9B |
| Revenue growth | — | +6% | -8% | -2% | — |
| Gross profit | $11.7B | $11.4B | $10.6B | $11.1B | $11.3B |
| EBITDA | $2.71B | $2.48B | $1.94B | $2.14B | $2.36B |
| Net income | $368M | $182M | -$1.13B | $390M | $1.01B |
| Free cash flow | $1.52B | $1.32B | $670M | $1.44B | $728M |
| Capital expenditure | $430M | $457M | $602M | $919M | $3.29B |
| Total debt | $9.20B | $9.25B | $9.47B | $9.83B | $10.2B |
The default views of Competitor Analysis ▸ Charts, drawn from the same data. Open them in the cockpit to change the axes, pin companies and read every value.
| Company | Market cap | 6M return | Revenue growth | Op. margin | Forward P/E | Req g |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Estée Lauder Companies (The) EL | $39.9B | +28% | +6% | 13% | 31.1× | 16.8% |
| L'Oreal OR.PA | $268B | +25% | +3% | 21% | 32.8× | 18.1% |
| LVMH Moet Hennessy Louis Vuitton MC.PA | $226B | -11% | -4% | 22% | 18.6× | 10.2% |
| Shiseido 4911.T | $9.52B | +20% | +5% | 4% | 32.8× | 17.5% |
| Coty COTY | $3.57B | +64% | -1% | 5% | 13.3× | 11.3% |
Peer set: Industry: the same industry and sector in any market, nearest in size. This is the same default set the interactive Competitor Analysis opens with.
| Measure | EL | Peer median | Rank in peer set |
|---|---|---|---|
| 1-month return | +16.7% | +10.6% | 3rd highest of 16 |
| 6-month return | +28.2% | +15.8% | 4th highest of 16 |
| Distance from 52-week high | -8.9% | -5.1% | 6th lowest of 16 |
| Revenue growth (TTM) | +6.2% | +0.3% | 4th highest of 16 |
| Operating margin | 12.5% | 16.1% | 6th lowest of 16 |
| Forward P/E | 31.1× | 24.2× | 4th most expensive of 16 |
| Growth the price implies (Req g, 7 yrs) | 16.8% | 2.7% | 4th most demanding of 16 |
| Growth delivered (Del g) | -1.5% | +4.1% | 3rd lowest of 16 |
| Hurdle (Req g minus delivered) | +18.3 pp | +2.1 pp | 3rd most demanding of 16 |
| ROIC minus cost of capital | +5.2 pp | +6.9 pp | 3rd lowest of 16 |
| EV / EBITDA | 16.9× | 14.4× | 7th most expensive of 16 |
| Net debt / EBITDA | 2.2× | 1.4× | 5th most indebted of 16 |
| Bond spread | 72 bp | 67 bp | 4th widest of 9 |
| Company | Market | Market cap | 6M return | Revenue growth | Op. margin | Forward P/E | Req g | Delivered g |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Estée Lauder Companies (The) EL | United States | $39.9B | +28% | +6% | 13% | 31.1× | 16.8% | -1.5% |
| Givaudan GIVN.SW | Switzerland | $45.8B | +47% | -2% | 18% | 34.0× | 10.6% | +3.4% |
| Reckitt Benckiser RKT.L | United Kingdom | $47.6B | +22% | -2% | 28% | 16.4× | 1.6% | +0.3% |
| Hindustan Unilever HINDUNILVR.NS | India | $49.6B | -12% | +6% | 21% | 41.5× | 27.2% | +6.5% |
| DSM-Firmenich DSFIR.AS | Netherlands | $29.5B | +62% | -45% | 8% | 30.1× | 24.3% | +2.5% |
| Church & Dwight CHD | United States | $25.8B | +17% | +2% | 18% | 27.4× | 6.9% | +4.8% |
| Kimberly-Clark KMB | United States | $66.5B | +12% | -12% | 14% | 15.3× | 4.1% | -3.0% |
| Kao 4452.T | Japan | $21.8B | +33% | +6% | 10% | 24.4× | 1.5% | +4.1% |
| Colgate-Palmolive CL | United States | $76.8B | +10% | +6% | 22% | 24.2× | -5.5% | +4.4% |
| Beiersdorf BEI.DE | Germany | $20.4B | +21% | -2% | 12% | 22.6× | -2.3% | +7.0% |
| Essity ESSITY-A.ST | Sweden | $19.9B | +17% | -2% | 12% | 15.4× | -3.3% | +2.6% |
| Puig Brands PUIG.MC | Spain | $12.5B | +16% | +4% | 16% | 17.9× | -3.0% | +11.7% |
| Marico MARICO.NS | India | $12.3B | +8% | +20% | 16% | 51.8× | 28.0% | +11.1% |
| Unicharm 8113.T | Japan | $12.1B | +15% | 0% | 12% | 24.5× | -2.0% | +5.4% |
| Clorox CLX | United States | $12.1B | +8% | +6% | 14% | 17.4× | 2.7% | -1.8% |
| Unilever ULVR.L | United Kingdom | $143B | +15% | -20% | 20% | 18.4× | 8.0% | -0.8% |
Estée Lauder Companies (The) has 13 bonds outstanding with $7.25B face value. The agencies rate it A-; its bonds trade like A. Weighted yield 5.56%, a spread of 72 bp over government bonds.
Estée Lauder Companies (The) reported $779M of remaining performance obligations at 30 Sep 2026 and up 3% from the previous quarter. That is 0.1 years of trailing revenue already under contract. Book-to-bill last quarter: 1.01.