JetBlue Airways Earnings Preview

Motley Fool Staff
Updated

Investors hope JetBlue Airways (NAS: JBLU) will top analyst estimates once again after beating predictions by $0.04 in the previous quarter. The company will unveil its latest earnings on Thursday, April 26. JetBlue Airways is a passenger airline that provides competitive fares mainly on point-to-point routes.

What analysts say:

  • Buy, sell, or hold?: Analysts are bullish on JetBlue Airways as five analysts rate it as a buy and only two analysts rate it as a sell. Analysts don't like JetBlue Airways as much as competitor US Airways Group overall. JetBlue Airways' rating hasn't changed over the past three months.

  • Revenue Forecasts: On average, analysts predict $1.19 billion in revenue this quarter. That would represent a rise of 17.8% from the year-ago quarter.

  • Wall Street Earnings Expectations: The average analyst estimate is earnings of $0.07 per share. Estimates range from $0.01 to $0.10.

What our community says:
The majority of CAPS All-Stars see JetBlue as a good bet, with 81.3% granting it an "outperform" rating. The greater community is in line with the All-Stars, as 82.1% give it a rating of "outperform." JetBlue Airways' bearish CAPS rating of two out of five stars falls short of the Fool community sentiment.


Management:
JetBlue Airways' income has fallen year-over-year by an average of 75.4% over the past five quarters. The company's gross margin shrank by 2.9 percentage points in the last quarter. Revenue rose 21.9% while cost of sales rose 27.9% to $706 million from a year earlier.

Now, a look at how efficient management has been at running the business. Margins illustrate how efficiently a company captures portions of sales dollars. JetBlue Airways has seen slipping gross margins year-over-year for the last four quarters. Gross margins reflect the total sales revenue retained after costs. Here is how JetBlue Airways has been doing for the last four quarters:

Quarter

Q4

Q3

Q2

Q1

Gross Margin

38.4%

37.7%

37.4%

37.6%

Operating Margin

7.2%

9.0%

7.5%

4.4%

Net Margin

2.0%

2.9%

2.2%

0.3%

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At the time thisarticle was published Try any of our Foolish newsletter services free for 30 days. We Fools may not all hold the same opinions, but we all believe that considering a diverse range of insights makes us better investors. The Motley Fool has a disclosure policy.Earnings estimates provided by Zacks.

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