If A.M. Castle (NYSE: CAS) misses estimates again it will be the third consecutive quarter for the company. The company will unveil its latest earnings on Tuesday, August 2. A. M. Castle provides a range of products and value-added processing and supply chain services to an array of customers, mainly within the producer durable equipment sector of the global economy.

What analysts say:

  • Buy, sell, or hold?: Analysts strongly back A.M. Castle, with three of four rating it a buy and the remainder rating it a hold. Analysts don't like A.M. Castle as much as competitor L.B. Foster Company overall. A.M. Castle's rating hasn't changed over the past three months.
  • Revenue Forecasts: On average, analysts predict $283.6 million in revenue this quarter. That would represent a rise of 18.1% from the year-ago quarter.
  • Wall Street Earnings Expectations: The average analyst estimate is earnings of 27 cents per share. Estimates range from 22 cents to 32 cents.

What our community says:
CAPS All Stars are solidly backing the stock with 97.7% awarding it an "outperform" rating. The community at large agrees with the All Stars with 94.9% granting it a rating of "outperform." Fools are keen on A.M. Castle, though the message boards have been quiet lately with only 43 posts in the past 30 days. Even with a robust four out of five stars, A.M. Castle's CAPS rating falls a little short of the community's upbeat outlook.

Management:

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

26.2%

27.3%

25.7%

25.7%

Operating Margin

0.8%

-1%

-0.1%

0.1%

Net Margin

1%

-0.6%

0%

0.2%

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