Exponent Earnings Preview

Exponent (Nasdaq: EXPO  ) will try to beat its earnings estimates for the fifth consecutive quarter. The company will unveil its latest earnings Wednesday. Exponent is a science and engineering consulting firm that provides high-quality engineering and scientific consulting services to clients around the world.

What analysts say:

• Buy, sell, or hold?: Analysts think investors should stand pat on Exponent with three of four analysts rating it hold. Analysts don't like Exponent as much as competitor Navigant Consulting overall. Four out of seven analysts rate Navigant Consulting a buy compared with one of four for Exponent. 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 $59.4 million in revenue this quarter. That would represent a rise of 4.4% from the year-ago quarter.
• Wall Street Earnings Expectations: The average analyst estimate is earnings of $0.51 per share. Estimates range from $0.49 to $0.53.

What our community says:
The majority of CAPS All-Stars see Exponent as a good bet, with 98.5% assigning it an "outperform" rating. The community at large backs the All-Stars with 97.8% awarding it a rating of "outperform." Fools have embraced Exponent, though the message boards have been quiet lately with only 56 posts in the past 30 days. Despite the majority sentiment in favor of Exponent, the stock has a middling CAPS rating of three out of five stars.

Management:
Exponent's profit has risen year over year by an average of 28.1% 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	Q2	Q1	Q4	Q3
Gross Margin	33.9%	29.2%	29.7%	30.1%
Operating Margin	20.5%	16.8%	15.0%	17.4%
Net Margin	12.6%	10.9%	9.9%	11.8%

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

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