Fair Isaac (NYSE: FICO) hasn't been able to establish an earnings trend, bouncing between beating and falling short of estimates during the past fiscal year. The company will unveil its latest earnings on Thursday, Jan. 26. Fair Isaac provides products and services that enable businesses to automate, improve, and connect decisions to enhance business performance.

What analysts say:

  • Buy, sell, or hold?: Analysts think investors should stand pat on Fair Isaac, with four out of five analysts rating it hold. Analysts don't like Fair Isaac as much as competitor ACI Worldwide overall. Six out of seven analysts rate ACI Worldwide a buy compared to one out of five for Fair Isaac. 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 $158.9 million in revenue this quarter. That would represent a rise of 1.9% from the year-ago quarter.
  • Wall Street earnings expectations: The average analyst estimate is earnings of $0.61 per share. Estimates range from $0.57 to $0.67.

What our community says:
CAPS All-Stars are solidly backing the stock, with 83.8% awarding it an outperform rating. The community at large concurs with the All-Stars, with 76.9% granting it a rating of outperform. Fools have embraced Fair Isaac, though the message boards have been quiet lately, with only 60 posts in the past 30 days. Fair Isaac's bearish CAPS rating of one out of five stars falls short of the Fool community sentiment.

Management:
Fair Isaac's profit has risen year over year by an average of 8.7% over the past five 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

Q4

Q3

Q2

Q1

Gross Margin

69.6%

71.2%

68.3%

70.6%

Operating Margin

25.6%

24.8%

12.6%

19%

Net Margin

15.4%

15.4%

5.1%

10.3%

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Earnings estimates provided by Zacks.