Investors are bracing for the worst and waiting to see if Gentiva Health Services (Nasdaq: GTIV) will fall short of Wall Street forecasts for the third consecutive quarter. The company will unveil its latest earnings on Tuesday, Feb. 7. Gentiva Health Services provides comprehensive home health services throughout most of the United States.

What analysts say:

  • Buy, sell, or hold?: Analysts think investors should stand pat on Gentiva Health Services, with six out of eight analysts rating it hold. Analysts don't like Gentiva Health Services as much as competitor Transcend Services overall. Six out of six analysts rate Transcend Services a buy compared to one out of eight for Gentiva Health Services. While analysts still rate the stock a hold, they are a little more optimistic about it compared to three months ago.
  • Revenue forecasts: On average, analysts predict $442.3 million in revenue this quarter. That would represent a decline of 4.9% from the year-ago quarter.
  • Wall Street earnings expectations: The average analyst estimate is earnings of $0.30 per share. Estimates range from $0.23 to $0.39.

What our community says:
CAPS All-Stars are solidly supporting the stock, with 96.5% awarding it an outperform rating. The greater community backs the All-Stars, as 95.3% give it a rating of outperform. Fools are impressed with Gentiva Health Services and haven't been shy with their opinions lately, logging 111 posts in the past 30 days. Even with a robust four out of five stars, Gentiva Health Services' CAPS rating falls a little short of the community's upbeat outlook.

Management:
The company's gross margin shrank by five percentage points in the last quarter. Revenue rose 16% while cost of sales rose 27.9% to $242.9 million from a year earlier.

Now let's get some insight into how efficient management is at running the business. Margins illustrate how efficiently a company captures portions of sales dollars. Gentiva Health Services' gross margins, which reflect the total sales revenue retained after costs, have been dropping year over year for the last four quarters. Here is how Gentiva Health Services has been doing for the last four quarters:

Quarter

Q3

Q2

Q1

Q4

Gross Margin

46%

47.7%

48.7%

49.9%

Operating Margin

(137.7%)

5.3%

10.5%

11.2%

Net Margin

(105.3%)

1.1%

2.9%

3.4%

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Earnings estimates provided by Zacks.