Earnings Preview: Dollar General

Dollar General DG unveils its next round of earnings this Thursday, December 03. Get prepared with Benzinga's ultimate preview for Dollar General's Q3 earnings.

Net Income, Earnings, And Earnings Per Share

Earnings and especially earnings per share (EPS) are useful measures of a company's profitability. Total earnings, which is also referred to as net income, equals total revenue minus total expenses. EPS equals to net income divided by the number of shares outstanding.

Earnings And Revenue

Wall Street expects EPS of $1.97 and sales around $8.12 billion. In the same quarter last year, Dollar General announced EPS of $1.42 on revenue of $6.99 billion.

Why Analyst Estimates And Earnings Surprises Are Important

Analysts who cover this company will publish forward-looking estimates of its revenue and EPS each quarter. Averaging together every EPS and revenue prediction that each analyst makes about a company in a quarter yields the "consensus estimates." A company posting earnings or revenue above or below the consensus estimate is known as an "earnings surprise" and may move the stock by a considerable margin.

The analyst consensus estimate would represent a 38.73% increase in the company's earnings. Revenue would be have grown 16.15% from the same quarter last year. The company's reported EPS has stacked up against analyst estimates in the past like this:

Stock Performance

Shares of Dollar General were trading at $219.75 as of December 01. Over the last 52-week period, shares are up 40.34%. Given that these returns are generally positive, long-term shareholders can be satisfied going into this earnings release.

Do not be surprised to see the stock move on comments made during its conference call. Dollar General is scheduled to hold the call at 10:00:00 ET and can be accessed here.