JetBlue Airways (Nasdaq: JBLU) came in under analysts' estimates last quarter but now has a chance to fix things this quarter. The company will unveil its latest earnings on Wednesday. JetBlue Airways is a passenger airline that provides competitive fares mainly on point-to-point routes.

What analysts say:

  • Buy, sell, or hold?: Analysts are bullish on JetBlue Airways as seven analysts rate it as a buy and only one analyst rates it as a sell. Analysts don't like JetBlue Airways as much as competitor US Airways Group overall. Analysts still rate the stock a Hold, but they are a bit more wary about it compared to three months ago.
  • Revenue forecasts: On average, analysts predict $1.2 billion in revenue this quarter. That would represent a rise of 16.5% from the year-ago quarter.
  • Wall Street earnings expectations: The average analyst estimate is earnings of $0.14 per share. Estimates range from $0.11 to $0.28.

What our community says:
CAPS All-Stars are solidly behind the stock with 81.3% granting it an outperform rating. The community at large concurs with the All-Stars with 82.2% giving it a rating of outperform. Fools are gung-ho about JetBlue Airways and haven't been shy with their opinions lately, logging 626 posts in the past 30 days. JetBlue Airways' bearish CAPS rating of two out of five stars falls short of the Fool community sentiment.

Management:
The company's gross margin shrank by 6.2 percentage points in the last quarter. Revenue rose 22.6% while cost of sales rose 36% to $721 million from a year earlier.

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

37.4%

37.6%

41.3%

45.4%

Operating Margin

7.5%

4.4%

6.1%

13.6%

Net Margin

2.2%

0.3%

1.0%

5.7%

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