Watch Cooper Companies' (NYSE: COO) earnings report to see if it can beat analyst expectations for the fourth consecutive quarter. The company will unveil its latest earnings on Wednesday, August 31. Cooper Companies develops, manufactures, and markets healthcare products (primarily medical devices) through its two business units, CooperVision and CooperSurgical.

What analysts say:

  • Buy, sell, or hold?: Analysts strongly back Cooper Companies, with six of eight rating it a buy and the remainder rating it a hold. Analysts like Cooper Companies better than competitor Teleflex overall. Analysts still rate the stock a moderate buy, but they are a bit more wary about it compared to three months ago.
  • Revenue Forecasts: On average, analysts predict $331.8 million in revenue this quarter. That would represent a rise of 12.2% from the year-ago quarter.
  • Wall Street Earnings Expectations: The average analyst estimate is earnings of $1.08 per share. Estimates range from $1.05 to $1.10.

What our community says:
Most CAPS All Stars are skeptical of COO prospects, with 56.5% assigning it an "underperform" rating. While the All Stars do not like COO, the community likes it with 69.5% granting it an "overperform" rating The Fool community on the other hand is more skeptical, with 30.5% awarding it an "underperform" rating. Fools are bearish on Cooper Companies, though the message boards have been quiet lately with only 41 posts in the past 30 days. Cooper Companies' bearish CAPS rating of two out of five stars falls short of the Fool community sentiment.

Management:
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

Q2

Q1

Q4

Q3

Gross Margin

62.0%

60.2%

59.8%

59.5%

Operating Margin

18.5%

18.7%

19.9%

17.4%

Net Margin

10.9%

15.4%

15.4%

13.4%

One final thing: If you want to keep tabs on Cooper Companies movements, and for more analysis on the company, make sure you add it to your Watchlist.

Try any of our Foolish newsletter services free for 30 days. We Fools may not all hold the same opinions, but we all believe that considering a diverse range of insights makes us better investors. The Motley Fool has a disclosure policy.