While Astoria (NYSE: AF) missed estimates last quarter, investors hope that it will bounce back and outpace Wall Street expectations this quarter. The company will unveil its latest earnings Wednesday. Astoria Financial is a unitary savings and loan association holding company for Astoria Federal Savings and Loan Association that provides various banking services.

What analysts say:

  • Buy, sell, or hold?: Analysts think investors should stand pat on Astoria with nine of 13 analysts rating it hold. Analysts like Astoria better than competitor Northfield Bancorp overall. Zero out of one analysts rate Northfield Bancorp a buy compared with three of 13 for Astoria. Analysts still rate the stock a hold, but they are a bit more wary about it compared with three months ago.
  • Revenue Forecasts: On average, analysts predict $94 million in revenue this quarter. That would represent a decline of 11.3% from the year-ago quarter.
  • Wall Street Earnings Expectations: The average analyst estimate is earnings of $0.19 per share. Estimates range from $0.16 to $0.25.

What our community says:
CAPS All-Stars are split on Astoria, with 53.8% rating it an "outperform" and 46.2% giving it an "underperform" rating. The community is of two minds on the stock with 47.1% Fools assigning it an "outperform" rating and 52.9% an "underperform" rating. Fools are keen on Astoria, though the message boards have been quiet lately with only 27 posts in the past 30 days. Astoria's bearish CAPS rating of one out of five stars falls short of the Fool community sentiment.

Management:
Astoria's profit has risen year over year by an average of more than twofold over the past five quarters. Revenue has fallen for the past three 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 net margins over the past four quarters.

Quarter

Q2

Q1

Q4

Q3

Net Margin

8.6%

13.4%

11.0%

9.4%

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

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