HNI Earnings Preview

HNI (NYSE: HNI  ) beat estimates by $0.01 last quarter and investors are hoping it can beat them again. The company will unveil its latest earnings Thursday. HNI Corporation is a provider of office furniture and hearth products.

What analysts say:

• Buy, sell, or hold?: Analysts think investors should stand pat on HNI with four of five analysts rating it hold. Analysts don't like HNI as much as competitor Steelcase overall. Four out of four analysts rate Steelcase a buy compared with one of five for HNI. 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 $491.4 million in revenue this quarter. That would represent a rise of 7.1% from the year-ago quarter.
• Wall Street Earnings Expectations: The average analyst estimate is earnings of $0.41 per share. Estimates range from $0.40 to $0.43.

What our community says:
CAPS All-Stars are solidly behind the stock with 93.3% granting it an "outperform" rating. The majority of the Fools are in agreement with the All-Stars as 72.9% give it an "outperform" rating. Fools are keen on HNI, though the message boards have been quiet lately with only 26 posts in the past 30 days. HNI's 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. 

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