Preview: IHS Markit's Earnings

IHS Markit INFO announces its next round of earnings this Tuesday, March 23. Here is Benzinga's everything-that-matters guide for this Tuesday's Q1 earnings announcement.

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 $0.7 and sales around $1.11 billion. In the same quarter last year, IHS Markit reported EPS of $0.66 on revenue of $1.08 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.

If the company were to report earnings in line when it publishes results Tuesday, quarterly profit would be up 6.06%. Sales would be have grown 2.68% 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 IHS Markit were trading at $95.27 as of March 19. Over the last 52-week period, shares are up 64.32%. 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. IHS Markit is scheduled to hold the call at 08:00:00 ET and can be accessed here.