Medicis Pharmaceutical (NYSE: MRX) beat estimates by $0.01 last quarter, and investors are hoping it can beat them again. The company will unveil its latest earnings Tuesday Medicis Pharmaceutical focuses on helping patients attain a healthy and youthful appearance and self-image through the development and marketing in the U.S. of products for the treatment of dermatological and aesthetic conditions.

What analysts say:

  • Buy, sell, or hold?: Analysts are bullish on this stock with 11 analysts rating it as a buy and only one rating it as a sell. Analysts like Medicis Pharmaceutical better than competitor Impax Laboratories overall. Analysts haven't adjusted their rating of Medicis Pharmaceutical for the past three months.
  • Revenue forecasts: On average, analysts predict $188.8 million in revenue this quarter. That would represent a rise of 8.5% from the year-ago quarter.
  • Wall Street earnings expectations: The average analyst estimate is earnings of $0.64 per share. Estimates range from $0.61 to $0.67.

What our community says:
CAPS All-Stars are solidly behind the stock with 95.6% assigning it an "outperform" rating. The community at large concurs with the All-Stars with 93.2% awarding it a rating of "outperform." Fools are gung-ho about Medicis Pharmaceutical, though the message boards have been quiet lately with only 78 posts in the past 30 days. Despite the majority sentiment in favor of Medicis Pharmaceutical, the stock has a middling CAPS rating of three out of five stars.

Management:
Medicis Pharmaceutical's profit has risen year over year by an average of 20.2%. A year-over-year revenue decrease last quarter snaps a streak of three consecutive quarters of revenue increases.

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

91.3%

89.2%

89.8%

90.5%

Operating Margin

26.9%

20.2%

30.5%

33.8%

Net Margin

11.7%

13.1%

15.6%

21.0%

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