Benzinga | Feb 26, 2021 10:09AM EST

OraSure Technologies's Earnings: A Preview

OraSure Technologies (NASDAQ:OSUR) announces its next round of earnings this Monday, March 01. Here is Benzinga's everything-that-matters guide for this Monday's Q4 earnings announcement.

Net Income, Earnings, And Earnings Per Share

Earnings and especially earnings per share (EPS) are useful measures of a company's profitability. Total earnings, which is also referred to as net income, equals total revenue minus total expenses. EPS equals to net income divided by the number of shares outstanding.

Earnings And Revenue

Wall Street expects EPS of $0.07 and sales around $57.29 million. In the same quarter last year, OraSure Technologies announced EPS of $0.06 on revenue of $49.67 million.

Why Analyst Estimates And Earnings Surprises Are Important

Analysts who cover this company will publish forward-looking estimates of its revenue and EPS each quarter. Averaging together every EPS and revenue prediction that each analyst makes about a company in a quarter yields the "consensus estimates." A company posting earnings or revenue above or below the consensus estimate is known as an "earnings surprise" and may move the stock by a considerable margin.

If the company were to match the consensus estimate, earnings would be up 16.67%. Sales would be up 15.35% from the year-ago period. OraSure Technologies's reported EPS has stacked up against analyst estimates in the past like this:

Quarter Q3 2020 Q2 2020 Q1 2020 Q4 2020EPS Estimate -0.07 -0.09 -0.06 0.07EPS Actual 0.01 -0.16 -0.10 0.06Revenue Estimate 41.70 M 32.82 M 29.23 M 47.03 MRevenue Actual 48.01 M 29.26 M 31.60 M 49.67 M

Stock Performance

Shares of OraSure Technologies were trading at $10.69 as of February 25. Over the last 52-week period, shares are up 71.22%. Given that these returns are generally positive, long-term shareholders are probably happy going into this earnings release.

Do not be surprised to see the stock move on comments made during its conference call. OraSure Technologies is scheduled to hold the call at 17:00:00 ET and can be accessed here.