Earnings Outlook for Hormel Foods

Hormel Foods HRL unveils its next round of earnings this Thursday, February 18. Get prepared with Benzinga's ultimate preview for Hormel Foods's Q1 earnings.

Net Income, Earnings, And Earnings Per Share

Earnings and EPS are useful metrics of profitability. Total earnings also known as net income is equal to total revenue minus total expenses. Dividing net income by the total number of shares outstanding yields EPS.

Earnings And Revenue

Based on management's projections, Hormel Foods analysts model for earnings of $0.41 per share on sales of $2.37 billion. Hormel Foods reported a per-share profit of $0.45 when it published results during the same quarter last year. Sales in that period totaled $2.38 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 Wall Street estimate would represent a 8.89% decline in the company's earnings. Sales would have fallen 0.59% from the same quarter last year. Here is how the company's reported EPS has stacked up against analyst estimates in the past:

Stock Performance

Shares of Hormel Foods were trading at $47.05 as of February 16. Over the last 52-week period, shares are up 3.1%. Given that these returns are generally positive, long-term shareholders are probably happy going into this earnings release.

Do not be surprised to see the stock move on comments made during its conference call. Hormel Foods is scheduled to hold the call at 09:00:00 ET and can be accessed here.