TTM vs LTM (Difference: All You Need To Know)

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What is the difference between TTM and LTM?

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Let me explain to you the difference between Trailing Twelve Months vs Last Twelve Months!

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Difference TTM vs LTM

What is the difference between TTM and LTM?

In essence, TTM refers to “Trailing Twelve Months” and LTM refers to “Last Twelve Monts”.

While “Trailing Twelve Months” refers to a period starting as of today and moving back in time for twelve months, “Last Twelve Months” refers to a period starting at a given point in time and moving back twelve months.

The difference is subtle but still an important one.

Investors, financial analysts, traders, and many other professionals consider that a 12-month period can provide useful information about a company’s performance keeping in mind that it still remains a relatively short period.

You’ll frequently see the terms “Last Twelve Months” or “Trailing Twelve Months” in a company’s financial statements or earnings reports.

Many companies will use LTM to report D/E metrics or various revenue metrics in their financial statements.

On the other hand, stock traders will want to look at a stock’s TTM to get a sense of the stock’s performance within the past twelve months so the numbers can be averaged out for seasonal or cyclical variations.

Both TTM and LTM cover a “twelve-month” reference period and both make reference to the past.

However, the main difference between them is the starting point and the end point.

Let’s look at some examples.

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• TTM meaning 

TTM Example

Let’s calculate TTM to better understand what it means.

TTM or Trailing Twelve Months provides financial data on a company’s financial performance in an annualized fashion by taking the immediately preceding twelve months.

Let’s assume Company ABC reported the following quarterly earnings:

• Q1 Year 1: $10,000,000
• Q2 Year 1: $12,000,000
• Q3 Year 1: $14,000,000
• Q4 Year 1: $16,000,000
• Q1 Year 2: $12,000,000

In this example, in Year 1, Company ABC generated $52,000,000  ($10M + $12M + $14M + $16M).

However, to calculate the “trailing twelve months”, we’ll need to start as of today (Q1 Year 2) and calculate the twelve months preceding that (Q2 Year 1 to Q1 Year 2).

The Trailing Twelve Months will give us $54,000,000 ($12M + $14M + $16M + $12M).

As you can see, when we look at the trailing twelve months, we can see the company’s performance in the most recent twelve-month reference period.

LTM Example

Now let’s look at an example of LTM.

LTM refers to the last twelve months.

Depending on the date you start calculating the LTM, it can also coincide with TTM.

That’s why many will use LTM and TTM interchangeably.

Many companies use the Last Twelve Months to report earnings on their financials statements providing a twelve-month reference period from the moment their financial report was issued.

As a result, the Last Twelve Months has a defined starting point in the past and a an ending point ending twelve months prior to it.

For example, a company may issue its financial statements on January 31st of a given year and provide LTM figures starting from January 1st of the year prior all the way to December 31st.

In this case, LTM does not correspond to a twelve months reference period starting as of “today” but it’s nonetheless close.

LTM vs TTM Takeaways

So there you have it folks!

Both LTM and TTM are useful figures to assess and analyze a company’s financial performance over a twelve-month reference period.

Although LTM and TTM may be used interchangeably, they are not technically quite the same.

The “Trailing Twelve Months” is a figure covering a twelve-month period starting from today and moving back twelve months in time.

The “Last Twelve Months” is a figure covering a period of twelve months starting from a given point in time in the past.

Now that you know the difference between TTM and LTM, good luck with your financial calculations.

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