Is the business good?
How good a business is LIN?
Linde plc earns 12% on the capital it employs against a 9.0% cost of capital, so the business is worth more the bigger it gets.
12%
Return on invested capital · cost of capital 9.0% · 2.9 points above what the capital costs: growth creates value
- Operating margin
- 26%
Operating margin · Specialty Chemicals median 9.1% · 12 months to Q2 2026
- Cash conversion
- 0.69×
Cash conversion · 0.76× a year ago · some of the reported profit has not turned into cash yet
- Share count, year on year
- −1.9%
Share count, year on year · bought back, each share owns more of the company
| Year | Operating margin |
|---|---|
| FY2020 | 12% |
| FY2021 | 16% |
| FY2022 | 16% |
| FY2023 | 24% |
| FY2024 | 26% |
| FY2025 | 26% |
Details›
- Gross margin12 months to Q2 2026
- 48%
- Operating margin12 months to Q2 2026
- 26%
- Net margin12 months to Q2 2026
- 20%
- Free cash flow margin
- 14%
- R&D as % of revenue
- 0.41%
- Revenue, trailing twelve months
- $35.4B
- Free cash flow, trailing twelve months
- $4.97B
- Net income, trailing twelve months
- $7.24B
- Return on invested capitaloperating profit after tax ÷ debt + equity − cash
- 12%
Margins, capital and share counts from the statements as filed with the SEC; cash conversion from the cash flow statement.
Specialty Chemicals
Ranks #10 of 36 by Smart Score