Should You Buy Lockheed Martin Stock Right Now?
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By Rich Smith – Mar 20, 2026 at 2:05AM ESTKey PointsGreece is preparing to spend $1.2 billion upgrading older Lockheed Martin F-16s. Greece also has orders in for 20 to 40 of Lockheed's newer F-35 stealth fighter jet.The F-16 is the world's most popular fighter jet, and the F-35 might soon be second.With $75 billion in annual revenue, defense contractor Lockheed Martin (LMT 0.94%) is literally the world's largest pure-play defense stock. And now it's time to watch Lockheed Martin get even bigger. This week, Reuters reported that the government of Greece is preparing to spend massively to upgrade its military after watching neighboring Cyprus suffer multiple attacks from Iranian drones and ballistic missiles. Total spending on the defense program could exceed 4 billion euros (about $4.6 billion). At least 1 billion of that -- $1.15 billion -- would go directly to Lockheed Martin to pay for upgrading 38 F-16C fighter jets into the modern F-16 Vipers. The F-16 Viper (aka F-16V) boasts improved bomb load, better radar, better computers, and -- importantly -- the ability to integrate its data feeds with fifth-generation fighters such as Lockheed's own F-35 Lightning II. To date, Greece has ordered 20 F-35s from Lockheed, with options to buy 20 more. Image source: Getty Images. You get an F-16! And you get an F-16! Lockheed Martin's F-16 is hands down the most popular fighter jet in the world. According to aviation news site FlightGlobal, fully 15% of all fighter jets on Earth (2,102 planes in active service) are Lockheed Martin F-16s. Greece alone owns 152 of them, but has upgraded only about 40 to F-16Vs -- meaning this week's $1.15 billion deal could expand to as much as $3.5 billion as Greece continues to upgrade the fleet. Nor is Greece the only country upgrading its air force with F-16s.
Aerospace Global News reports that Greek neighbor Bulgaria and nearby Slovakia are buying F-16Vs. Ukraine, Romania, and Argentina are all buying used F-16s that might be upgraded later (by Lockheed Martin). Turkey is both buying new and upgrading existing F-16s. Long story short, even if the F-35 -- called Lockheed's "trillion-dollar warplane" for the amount of orders it's expected to collect in total -- is the future for Lockheed Martin, the aerospace giant is also making bank by selling and upgrading the plane that made it famous in the first place. ExpandNYSE: LMTLockheed MartinToday's Change(-0.94%) $-6.02Current Price$636.26Key Data PointsMarket Cap$147BDay's Range$624.02 - $639.7952wk Range$410.11 - $692.00Volume83KAvg Vol1.7MGross Margin11.04%Dividend Yield2.12% Is Lockheed Martin stock a buy? Priced at 30 times earnings and more than twice trailing sales, it's not cheap. Over the past two decades, Lockheed's stock price has averaged closer to 1.3 times sales, suggesting investors may be reading too much into current demand. That said, Lockheed is generating a lot of cash right now -- $6.9 billion over the past 12 months, according to data from S&P Global Market Intelligence, or nearly 40% more than reported net income. Given the price-to-free-cash-flow ratio of only 21.5, the 2.1% dividend yield, and the analyst forecast of nearly 19% long-term earnings growth, there's an argument to be made that Lockheed stock is cheaper than it looks. If you ask me, it really all depends on the growth rate. If the analysts are right, though, and Lockheed grows as fast as they're projecting, Lockheed Martin stock could be fairly priced -- and maybe even cheap enough to buy.Read NextMar 19, 2026 •By Todd ShriberWill Greece's New Air Defense Plan Boost Lockheed Martin's Stock?Mar 18, 2026 •By Brett SchaferThe Top 2 Industrial Stocks to Buy Right NowMar 17, 2026 •By Justin PopeBetter Defense Stock: Lockheed Martin vs. RTXMar 11, 2026 •By Matthew BenjaminThis is a Great ETF to Own in Times of Geopolitical UncertaintyMar 8, 2026 •By Rich SmithSpace Force Makes the Obvious Choice, Halts Rocket Launches at Boeing's and Lockheed's Space BusinessMar 7, 2026 •By Rich SmithLockheed vs. Anduril: Who Will Build the Army's Next Great Command and Control System?About the AuthorRich Smith is a contributing Motley Fool defense and stock market analyst covering publicly traded and emerging companies in defense, space, aerospace, and other sectors. Prior to The Motley Fool, Rich practiced international corporate law for Clifford Chance in Russia, and for the Russian-Ukrainian Legal Group in Moscow, Kyiv, and Washington, D.C. He holds a bachelor’s degree in international relations from the College of William & Mary, a law degree from the University of Baltimore, and a language certification from the International Institute of Russian Language & Culture in Tver, Russian Federation. The Globe and Mail once featured him as “one of the best stock pickers since 2009.”TMFDittyX@RichSmithFoolStocks MentionedLockheed MartinNYSE: LMT$636.26(-0.94%)-$6.02*Average returns of all recommendations since inception. Cost basis and return based on previous market day close.