Curtiss-Wright Earnings Preview

Motley Fool Staff
Updated

Investors are on the edge of their collective seats, hoping that Curtiss-Wright (NYS: CW) will top analyst expectations for the fourth consecutive quarter. The company will unveil its latest earnings Thursday. Curtiss-Wright is a multinational manufacturing and service company that designs, manufactures, and overhauls precision components and systems, and provides highly engineered products and services.

What analysts say:

  • Buy, sell, or hold?: Analysts think investors should stand pat on Curtiss-Wright, with five of nine analysts rating it hold. Analysts like Curtiss-Wright better than competitor Watts Water Technologies overall. Five out of 14 analysts rate Watts Water Technologies a buy compared with four of nine for Curtiss-Wright. Analysts still rate the stock a hold, but they are a bit more wary about it compared with three months ago.

  • Revenue forecasts: On average, analysts predict $481.8 million in revenue this quarter. That would represent a rise of 4.2% from the year-ago quarter.

  • Wall Street earnings expectations: The average analyst estimate is earnings of $0.59 per share. Estimates range from $0.52 to $0.64.

What our community says:
CAPS All-Stars are solidly behind the stock, with 98.7% granting it an "outperform" rating. The community at large backs the All-Stars, with 100% assigning it a rating of "outperform." Fools have embraced Curtiss-Wright, though the message boards have been quiet lately with only 49 posts in the past 30 days. Curtiss-Wright has a bullish CAPS rating of five out of five stars that is about on par with the Fool community assessment.

Management:
Curtiss-Wright's profit has risen year over year by an average of 24.8%. Revenue has now gone up for three straight quarters.

Now let's look at how efficient management is at running the business. Traditionally, margins represent the efficiency with which companies capture portions of sales dollars. The following table shows gross, operating, and net margins over the past four quarters.

Quarter

Q1

Q4

Q3

Q2

Gross Margin

32.3%

33.2%

33.4%

33.4%

Operating Margin

9.0%

10.9%

10.3%

9.4%

Net Margin

5.3%

7.0%

6.0%

5.6%

One final thing: If you want to keep tabs on Curtiss-Wright movements, and for more analysis on the company, make sure you add it to your watchlist.

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At the time thisarticle was published

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