Cedar Fair Crushes Earnings Estimates

Seth Jayson, The Motley Fool
Updated

Cedar Fair (NYS: FUN) reported earnings on Aug. 9. Here are the numbers you need to know.

The 10-second takeaway
 For the quarter ended July 1 (Q2), Cedar Fair crushed expectations on revenues and crushed expectations on earnings per share.

Compared to the prior-year quarter, revenue expanded significantly and GAAP earnings per share improved significantly.


Margins improved across the board.

Revenue details
 Cedar Fair reported revenue of $357.6 million. The three analysts polled by S&P Capital IQ wanted to see a top line of $296.6 million on the same basis. GAAP reported sales were 26% higher than the prior-year quarter's $284.5 million.

Source: S&P Capital IQ. Quarterly periods. Dollar amounts in millions. Non-GAAP figures may vary to maintain comparability with estimates.

EPS details
 EPS came in at $0.77. The two earnings estimates compiled by S&P Capital IQ predicted $0.40 per share. GAAP EPS of $0.65 for Q2 were much higher than the prior-year quarter's $0.08 per share.

Source: S&P Capital IQ. Quarterly periods. Non-GAAP figures may vary to maintain comparability with estimates.

Margin details
 For the quarter, gross margin was 50.0%, 350 basis points better than the prior-year quarter. Operating margin was 24.1%, 570 basis points better than the prior-year quarter. Net margin was 10.2%, 860 basis points better than the prior-year quarter.

Looking ahead
 Next quarter's average estimate for revenue is $591.8 million. On the bottom line, the average EPS estimate is $3.25.

Next year's average estimate for revenue is $1.07 billion. The average EPS estimate is $2.32.

Investor sentiment
 The stock has a three-star rating (out of five) at Motley Fool CAPS, with 356 members out of 435 rating the stock outperform, and 79 members rating it underperform. Among 116 CAPS All-Star picks (recommendations by the highest-ranked CAPS members), 101 give Cedar Fair a green thumbs-up, and 15 give it a red thumbs-down.

Of Wall Street recommendations tracked by S&P Capital IQ, the average opinion on Cedar Fair is buy, with an average price target of $34.00.

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The article Cedar Fair Crushes Earnings Estimates originally appeared on Fool.com.

Seth Jayson had no position in any company mentioned here at the time of publication. You can view his stock holdings here. He is co-advisor ofMotley Fool Hidden Gems, which provides new small-cap ideas every month, backed by a real-money portfolio. The Motley Fool has no positions in the stocks mentioned above. 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

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