Investors are on the edge of their collective seats, hoping that Ashland (NYSE: ASH) will top analyst expectations for the fifth consecutive quarter. The company will unveil its latest earnings on Tuesday. Ashland is a global specialty chemicals company that provides products, services, and solutions that meet customer needs throughout a variety of industries.

What analysts say:

  • Buy, sell, or hold?: Analysts are very bullish on this stock, unanimously backing it as a buy. Analysts like Ashland better than competitor Dow Chemical overall. Five out of 15 analysts rate Dow Chemical a buy compared to nine of nine for Ashland. Analysts' rating of Ashland has stayed constant from three months prior.
  • Revenue forecasts: On average, analysts predict $2.08 billion in revenue this quarter. That would represent a rise of 33.3% from the year-ago quarter.
  • Wall Street earnings expectations: The average analyst estimate is earnings of $1.38 per share. Estimates range from $1.35 to $1.40.

What our community says:
CAPS All-Stars are enthusiastically backing the stock, with 92.7% awarding it an outperform rating. The greater community concurs with the All-Stars, as 90% give it a rating of outperform. Despite the majority sentiment in favor of Ashland, the stock has a middling CAPS rating of three out of five stars.

Management:

Now let's look at how efficient management is at running the business. Margins are a representation of how efficiently a company captures portions of sales dollars. Ashland has seen decreasing net margins year-over-year for the last three quarters. Net margins reflect what percentage of each dollar earned by the company becomes profit. Here is how Ashland has been doing for the last four quarters:

Quarter

Q1

Q4

Q3

Q2

Gross Margin

27%

19.9%

25.9%

27.1%

Operating Margin

7.5%

(11.8%)

6.3%

7.8%

Net Margin

3.2%

(6.1%)

5.2%

22.7%

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Earnings estimates provided by Zacks.