OfficeMax (NYSE: OMX) beat estimates by $0.01 last quarter and investors are hoping it can beat them again. The company will unveil its latest earnings on Thursday, Feb. 23. OfficeMax provides office supplies; paper, print, and document services; technology products; and furniture to businesses, government offices, and consumers.

What analysts say:

  • Buy, sell, or hold?: Analysts think investors should stand pat on OfficeMax with five out of nine analysts rating it hold. Although analysts still rate the stock a hold, they are a bit more wary about it compared to three months ago.
  • Revenue forecasts: On average, analysts predict $1.8 billion in revenue this quarter. That would represent a rise of 1.7% from the year-ago quarter.
  • Wall Street earnings expectations: The average analyst estimate is earnings of $0.16 per share. Estimates range from $0.14 to $0.18.

What our community says:
Most CAPS All-Stars (63.3%) are assigning OfficeMax an outperform rating. The majority of the Fools agree with the All-Stars, with 58.4% giving it an outperform rating. OfficeMax's bearish CAPS rating of one out of five stars falls short of the Fool community 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 serve as an illustration of how efficiently a company captures portions of sales dollars. OfficeMax's gross margins, which reflect the total sales revenue retained after costs, have been dropping year over year for the last three quarters. Here is how OfficeMax has been doing for the last four quarters:

Quarter

Q3

Q2

Q1

Q4

Gross Margin

25.9%

25.8%

25.5%

25.3%

Operating Margin

2.3%

0.2%

1.5%

1.6%

Net Margin

1.2%

(0.1%)

0.6%

0.7%

One final thing: If you want to keep tabs on OfficeMax's movements, and for more analysis on the company, make sure you add it to your Watchlist.

Try any of our Foolish newsletter services free for 30 days. We Fools may not all hold the same opinions, but we all believe that considering a diverse range of insights makes us better investors. The Motley Fool has a disclosure policy.

Earnings estimates provided by Zacks.