will arctic cat beat estimates?
Snowmobile and ATV maker Arctic Cat Inc. is expected to release its third-quarter results on Wednesday. In advance of the Plymouth-based company's earnings report, analysts at Zacks Equity Research wrote that the company is a strong candidate to beat the 48 cents per share analysts are expecting.
"This company has seen a nice streak of beating earnings estimates, especially when looking at the previous two reports," analysts at Zachs wrote.
Zacks analysts are also expecting an earnings beat for the third quarter based on their Earnings ESP (Earnings Surprise Prediction) measure on Arctic Cat. Zacks uses Earnings ESP to find possible earnings beats by looking at the most recent analyst revisions on a company.
Zacks currently has a Rank #2 (a buy rating) on Arctic Cat and an Earnings ESP of 4.26 percent (a positive beat indication) and wrote "it seems pretty likely that ACAT could see another beat at its next report, especially if recent trends are any guide."
Fuller guidance conservative
In its fourth-quarter earnings release two weeks ago, H.B. Fuller Co. of Vadnais Heights offered guidance for next year. The company said it expects to earn 35 cents per share in the first quarter of fiscal 2015 and $2.60 per share for the year ended Nov. 30. The guidance has the company growing, but not as much as analysts expect.
Analysts at Deutsche Bank feel the company's estimates for 2015 were too conservative and are maintaining a "buy" recommendation on H.B. Fuller. Deutsche Bank's David Begleiter expects the company to earn $2.65 per share next year. "Management is assuming no benefit from raw-material costs," Begleiter wrote. "Given the 60 percent decline in oil since June, we believe this assumption is conservative."
Patrick Kennedy