Kirby Earnings Preview

Investors are on the edge of their collective seats, hoping that Kirby (NYSE: KEX  ) will top analyst expectations for the third consecutive quarter. The company will unveil its latest earnings on Wednesday. Kirby is a domestic inland tank barge operator with a fleet of 863 active tank barges and 220 towing vessels.

What analysts say

• Buy, sell, or hold?: Analysts strongly back Kirby, with 10 of 12 rating it a buy and the remainder rating it a hold. Analysts don't like Kirby as much as competitor Horizon Lines overall. That rating hasn't budged in three months as analysts have remained steady in their opinion of the stock.
• Revenue forecasts: On average, analysts predict $387.7 million in revenue this quarter. That would represent a rise of 41.7% from the year-ago quarter.
• Wall Street earnings expectations: The average analyst estimate is earnings of $0.74 per share. Estimates range from $0.72 to $0.77.

What our community says
CAPS All-Stars are solidly backing the stock with 98.2% awarding it an outperform rating. The community at large backs the All-Stars with 95.6% assigning it a rating of outperform. Fools have embraced Kirby, though the message boards have been quiet lately with only 54 posts in the past 30 days. Even with a robust four out of five stars, Kirby's CAPS rating falls a little short of the community's upbeat outlook.

Management
Kirby's profit has risen year over year by an average of 3.5%. Revenue has now gone up for three straight quarters.

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	38.0%	38.1%	38.8%	38.3%
Operating Margin	18.6%	18.8%	18.7%	18.5%
Net Margin	10.8%	11.0%	10.9%	10.7%

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