Investors are on the edge of their collective seats, hoping that ADTRAN (Nasdaq: ADTN) will top analyst expectations for the fifth consecutive quarter. The company will unveil its latest earnings on Wednesday, October 12. Adtran designs, manufactures, markets, and services network access solutions for communications networks.
What analysts say:
- Buy, sell, or hold?: Analysts strongly back ADTRAN, with 15 of 18 rating it a buy and the remainder rating it a hold. Analysts like ADTRAN better than competitor Tellabs overall. While analysts still rate the stock a moderate buy, they are a little more optimistic about it compared to three months ago.
- Revenue Forecasts: On average, analysts predict $189.4 million in revenue this quarter. That would represent a rise of 16.2% from the year-ago quarter.
- Wall Street Earnings Expectations: The average analyst estimate is earnings of $0.56 per share. Estimates range from $0.53 to $0.59.
What our community says:
CAPS All-Stars are solidly behind the stock with 94.7% giving it an "outperform" rating. The community at large concurs with the All-Stars with 90.8% awarding it a rating of "outperform." Fools are keen on ADTRAN, though the message boards have been quiet lately, with only 45 posts in the past 30 days. ADTRAN has a bullish CAPS rating of five out of five stars that is about on par with the Fool community assessment.
Management:
ADTRAN's profit has risen year over year by an average of 65.8% 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 | Q2 | Q1 | Q4 | Q3 |
| Gross Margin | 58% | 59.7% | 58.6% | 59.7% |
| Operating Margin | 27.9% | 27.6% | 27.1% | 27.6% |
| Net Margin | 20.1% | 20.7% | 21.8% | 19.7% |
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