How the Bulls and Bears Alike Can View GE After Its Earnings and Guidance

Industrials

Published: April 22, 2016 11:20 am

Last Updated: January 13, 2020 10:25 am

When it comes to the earnings reports from General Electric Co. (NYSE: GE), they still can perhaps best be described as “complicated and complex.” In fact, it may still be some time before investors and analysts can all see eye to eye here due to the complexities inside of GE. Investors have many reasons to feel suspect about GE’s earnings, but the long-term opportunists also have feathers in their caps.

On top of looking at earnings and some of the initial investment commentary from market pundits, 24/7 Wall St. wanted to do a look at both sides of the coin. Again, the bulls and the bears alike both have plenty of points here.

Going into earnings, GE’s consensus analyst price target was $33.09. At the start of this year, GE’s 2016 bullish and bearish case showed a consensus analyst price target that was lower than now, at $31.77, implying a total return of only about 4.9% at the time, if you include the dividend yield.

As far as the first quarter of 2016, General Electric did actually beat the consensus earnings per share (EPS) expectation ($0.21 vs. $0.19 expected). Revenue of $27.85 billion was ever so slightly ahead of the $27.62 billion expected. In the same period a year ago, GE reported EPS of $0.20 on revenues of $26.24 billion.