Office Depot (NYSE: ODP) came in under analysts' estimates last quarter but now has a chance to fix things. The company will unveil its latest earnings on Tuesday, July 26. Office Depot is a global supplier of office products and services under the Office Depot brand and other proprietary brand names.

What analysts say:

  • Buy, sell, or hold?: Analysts think investors should stand pat on Office Depot, with nine of 15 rating it hold. Analysts don't like Office Depot as much as competitor OfficeMax overall. Eight out of 13 analysts rate OfficeMax a buy, compared with three of 15 for Office Depot. While analysts still rate the stock a hold, they are a little more optimistic about it compared with three months ago.
  • Revenue forecasts: On average, analysts predict $2.73 billion in revenue this quarter. That would represent a rise of 1.1% from the year-ago quarter.
  • Wall Street earnings expectations: The average analyst estimate is a loss of $0.12 per share. Estimates range from a loss of $0.16 to a loss of $0.06.

What our community says:
CAPS All-Stars are solidly backing the stock, with 84% assigning it an "outperform" rating. The community at large agrees with the All-Stars, with 79.1% granting it a rating of "outperform." Fools are gung-ho about Office Depot and haven't been shy with their opinions lately, logging 278 posts in the past 30 days. Office Depot's bearish CAPS rating of one out of five stars falls short of the Fool community's sentiment.

Management:
Revenue has fallen for the past three 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 Q1 Q4 Q3 Q2
Gross Margin 29.5% 28.6% 28.6% 28.4%
Operating Margin 0.6% (2.5%) 0.3% (1%)
Net Margin (0.2%) (4.3%) 2.2% (0.4%)
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