Polaris Industries Earnings Preview

Polaris Industries (NYSE: PII  ) will try to beat its earnings estimates for the fifth consecutive quarter. The company will unveil its latest earnings on Tuesday, July 19. Polaris Industries designs, engineers, and manufactures off-road vehicles, which includes all-terrain vehicles and side-by-side vehicles for recreational and utility use, snowmobiles, and motorcycles.

What analysts say:

• Buy, sell, or hold?: Analysts strongly back Polaris Industries, with seven of 11 rating it a buy and the remainder rating it a hold. Analysts don't like Polaris Industries as much as competitor Brunswick overall.
• Revenue forecasts: On average, analysts predict $546.1 million in revenue this quarter. That would represent a rise of 26.7% from the year-ago quarter.
• Wall Street earnings expectations: The average analyst estimate is earnings of $1.17 per share. Estimates range from $1.10 to $1.32.

What our community says:
CAPS All-Stars are solidly behind the stock, with 87.3% granting it an "outperform" rating. The community at large backs the All-Stars, with 83% giving it a rating of "outperform." Fools are gung-ho about Polaris Industries, though the message boards have been quiet lately, with only 94 posts in the past 30 days. Polaris Industries' bearish CAPS rating of two out of five stars falls short of the Fool community sentiment.

Management:
Polaris Industries' profit has risen year over year by an average of 65.4%. The company upped its gross margin by 2 percentage points in the last quarter. Revenue rose 48.5% while cost of sales rose 44.4% to $385.4 million from a year earlier.

Now let's look at how efficient management is at running the business. Traditionally, margins represent the efficiency with which companies capture portions of sales dollars. The following table shows gross, operating, and net margins over the past four quarters. 

Quarter	Q1	Q4	Q3	Q2
Gross Margin	28.3%	27.7%	26%	26.2%
Operating Margin	13%	12.6%	11.7%	10%
Net Margin	8.8%	8.8%	8.1%	5.9%

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