To The Moon

nVent Electric plc (NYSE:NVT) shares traded higher Friday after the electrical connection and protection solutions provider reported record second-quarter 2026 results, as robust data-center demand and new product contributions drove sales and earnings above analyst expectations.

Earnings And Margins

Adjusted EPS rose 69% to $1.45, beating the $1.16 estimate. Sales increased 53% to $1.471 billion, topping the $1.259 billion estimate, while organic sales grew 47%. GAAP diluted EPS increased to $1.32 from 65 cents.

Operating income climbed 92% to $300.7 million, with operating margin expanding 410 basis points to 20.4%.

Adjusted operating income rose 61% to $322.7 million, while adjusted margin widened 110 basis points to 21.9%.

Segment Performance

Systems Protection sales jumped 70% to $1.072 billion, including 62% organic growth. Adjusted return on sales expanded 150 basis points to 23.2%.

Electrical Connections sales rose 21% to $399.2 million, including 18% organic growth. Adjusted return on sales declined 140 basis points to 27.3% as inflation and business mix pressured profitability.

Organic orders grew by a low-double-digit percentage, backlog reached $2.5 billion, and new products contributed more than 30 percentage points to sales growth.

Cash Flow And Balance Sheet

Operating cash flow more than doubled to $188.8 million, while free cash flow increased to $167.3 million from $74.1 million.

nVent ended the quarter with $256 million in cash and about $1.5 billion in debt.

Raised Outlook And Data-Center Expansion

The company raised full-year adjusted EPS guidance to $5.00-$5.10 from $4.45-$4.55, above the $4.60 estimate.

GAAP EPS guidance increased to $4.29-$4.39 from $3.68-$3.78, versus the $3.68 estimate.

Full-year sales guidance rose to $5.333 billion-$5.411 billion from $4.905 billion-$4.983 billion, above the $5.009 billion estimate.

For the third quarter, nVent projected adjusted EPS of $1.35-$1.38 versus $1.18 expected and GAAP EPS of $1.18-$1.21 versus 98 cents expected.

Reported sales growth of 32%-35% implies revenue of approximately $1.391 billion-$1.423 billion, compared with the $1.265 billion estimate.

nVent expects about $100 million of incremental tariff impact and more than $2 billion in 2026 data-center sales.

It plans to open a 160,000-square-foot liquid-cooling facility in Minnesota during the first half of 2027, creating more than 200 jobs. The project marks its third liquid-cooling capacity expansion in three years, adding more than 400,000 square feet overall.

NVT Price Action: nVent Electric shares were up 6.89% at $154.89 at the time of publication on Friday, according to Benzinga Pro data.