Honeywell lifts 2026 profit guidance after one-for-two reverse split

Honeywell Technologies raised its profit targets for the second half and full year of 2026 on Wednesday, though the increase is almost entirely mechanical, reflecting a one-for-two reverse stock split rather than a stronger business.

The move came from the same industrial group whose quantum computing arm staged one of the year’s largest technology listings, and it completes a sweeping breakup of the 140-year-old company.

The split took effect on 29 June, the same day Honeywell spun off its aerospace division as a separate public company. Every two Honeywell shares were combined into one, cutting the number of shares outstanding from about 634 million to roughly 317 million.

Because per-share earnings are divided across a smaller share count, the headline guidance figures roughly double even though the operating forecast beneath them is unchanged.

Honeywell Technologies now expects full-year adjusted earnings of $7.90 to $8.30 per share, up from an earlier range of $3.95 to $4.15.

For the second half, it guided to adjusted earnings of $4.40 to $4.70 per share, compared with $2.20 to $2.35 previously. The company also reduced its authorised share count from 2 billion to 1 billion and left the par value unchanged.

The spun-off unit, Honeywell Aerospace, began trading on Nasdaq under the ticker HONA, with shareholders receiving one aerospace share for every two Honeywell shares held.

Honeywell Technologies keeps the HON ticker and houses the automation, building-controls and process-technology businesses.

The two moves complete a three-way breakup announced last year, which also carved out Solstice Advanced Materials, the group’s advanced-materials arm.

Honeywell first set out the plan in February 2025, framing it as a way to give each business a cleaner investment case and its own path on capital allocation. It had pursued the separation under pressure from activist investor Elliott Investment Management, which built a stake of roughly $5 billion and pushed publicly for a split.

Once the pending disposals close, Honeywell Technologies will be the smallest of the three companies by revenue, but the one keeping the original name and the HON listing.

Chairman and Chief Executive Vimal Kapur cast the separation as the culmination of a three-year portfolio overhaul, saying both businesses were positioned to accelerate value creation as independent companies.

Aerospace, now led by Jim Currier, will operate as a standalone tier-one supplier to commercial and defence customers.

Stripped of the split arithmetic, the operating outlook for Honeywell Technologies is steady rather than improved. The company continues to guide to 2026 sales of $19.9 billion to $20.2 billion, organic growth of 2% to 3%, and free cash flow of about $2 billion, figures it first set out when it initiated the standalone outlook ahead of the aerospace separation.

Honeywell also retains a large stake in Quantinuum, the trapped-ion firm whose $1.68 billion IPO earlier this year set a new bar for the quantum sector.

That holding sits outside the automation guidance but remains a sizeable source of paper value, having priced at a valuation well above what the bankers initially targeted.

Two further disposals are still pending. Honeywell has agreed to sell its Productivity Solutions and Services unit and its Warehouse and Workflow Solutions business, both expected to close in the second half of the year, leaving behind a leaner group built around industrial and building automation, process technology and control systems.

The reverse split is designed to keep Honeywell’s share price meaningful now that the value of aerospace has left the company, a routine housekeeping step after a large spin-off.

It does not change the economics for existing holders, whose combined stake across the two businesses is unchanged, and it neither adds nor removes a dollar of value on its own.

Investors will get their first clean read on the slimmed-down company on 23 July, when Honeywell Technologies reports second-quarter results.

The call should show how the automation-focused business performs without aerospace, and whether the reaffirmed operating targets hold once the split arithmetic is set aside and the underlying demand comes into view.