Watch BJ's Wholesale Club's (NYSE: BJ) earnings report to see if it can beat analyst expectations for the third consecutive quarter. The company will unveil its latest earnings on Wednesday, August 17. BJ's Wholesale Club is a warehouse club operator in the Eastern United States.

What analysts say:

  • Buy, sell, or hold?: Analysts think investors should stand pat on BJ's Wholesale Club with eight of 10 analysts rating it hold. Analysts don't like BJ's Wholesale Club as much as competitor PriceSmart overall. One out of one analysts rate PriceSmart a buy compared to two of 10 for BJ's Wholesale Club. While analysts still rate the stock a Hold, they are a little more optimistic about it compared to three months ago.
  • Revenue Forecasts: On average, analysts predict $3 billion in revenue this quarter. That would represent a rise of 7.5% from the year-ago quarter.
  • Wall Street Earnings Expectations: The average analyst estimate is earnings of 76 cents per share. Estimates range from 72 cents to 80 cents.

What our community says:
CAPS All Stars are solidly behind the stock with 94.8% awarding it an "outperform" rating. The community at large backs the All Stars with 90.8% granting it a rating of "outperform." Fools are keen on BJ's Wholesale Club, though the message boards have been quiet lately with only 83 posts in the past 30 days. Even with a robust four out of five stars, BJ's Wholesale Club's CAPS rating falls a little short of the community's upbeat outlook.

Management:
BJ's Wholesale Club's income has fallen year over year by an average of 5.1% over the past five quarters. 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

10.4%

11.5%

10.5%

10.8%

Operating Margin

2%

2.2%

1.5%

2.2%

Net Margin

1.2%

0.4%

0.9%

1.3%

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