Technology

Top 7 Tech Earnings Previews for This Week

This week marks the official launch of earnings season. We will get to see key earnings reports from technology giants, banking giants, conglomerates energy players and more. 24/7 Wall St. wanted to bring earnings previews for the top seven technology stocks reporting earnings this week.

Before getting too biased, there are several things to consider. European weakness is back as a concern, but technology has so far managed to avoid some of the carnage. On Monday we also saw that the Dow Jones Industrial Average (DJIA) was back above 17,000 and the Nasdaq was firmly above 4,400.

24/7 Wall St. has offered up an earnings preview montage on the top seven technology earnings reports it will be watching this week. There are many other important earnings to watch in technology, and many key tech giants are due next week as well. Still, these seven technology earnings reports should set the trend of the entire tech sector this earnings season.

We have featured consensus estimates from Thomson Reuters, and color has been added on each of these tech leaders.

These are the top seven technology earnings we will be watching the most closely this week.

Intel Corp. (NASDAQ: INTC) is due to report after the close of trading on Tuesday. After it raised its guidance, we are curious as to what to expect for the quarter ahead. Intel’s lack of making any inroads in mobile has been ignored of late, yet investors remain hopeful that the PC-refresh cycle is still being driven in post-XP business world. Its consensus estimates are $0.52 earnings per share (EPS) and $13.69 billion in revenue. Intel’s share price is up almost 12% in the past month and up more than 22% so far in 2014. Our post-raised-guidance take: Intel is aiding six other semiconductor stocks higher — can that continue?

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Yahoo! Inc. (NASDAQ: YHOO) also reports after the close of trading on Tuesday. Yahoo! is still considered to be in turnaround mode, and analysts and the media keep questioning how the core business metrics turnaround is going — even with the stock having more than doubled at one point. Of course you can expect Alibaba’s IPO to be discussed for its financial benefits. Some $0.38 EPS are expected, (up three cents from last year) and revenue growth is expected to be 1.2% to $1.08 billion. While Yahoo! has more than doubled under Marissa Mayer’s tenure, the stock is actually down over 11% so far in 2014.

eBay Inc. (NASDAQ: EBAY) is set to report earnings on Wednesday after the close of trading. The company was shown to have kissed and made up with activist and billionaire Carl Icahn. The online auction and payment systems giant is expected to post earnings of $0.68 per share (versus $0.63 a year ago) on a 13% sales gain to $4.38 billion in revenue. Despite reaching an accord with Icahn, eBay shares are down almost 8% so far in 2014. The belief by many is that the value proposition was far lower than what it could have been.

SanDisk Corp.‘s (NASDAQ: SNDK) report is due Wednesday afternoon. The independent flash memory giant is now considered a benchmark for anything and everything tied to the growth of consumer electronics. This pertains to anything tied to smartphones, devices and tablets. SanDisk’s stock performance creates a conundrum — it almost certainly has to go above and beyond the call of duty by beating estimates and raising guidance. SanDisk shares are up almost 40% in the past quarter and are up by almost 50% since the end of 2013. The consensus estimates are $1.39 EPS (versus $1.21 last year) and $1.6 billion in revenue (up more than 8% from last year).

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Advanced Micro Devices Inc. (NYSE: AMD) is due to report earnings on Thursday. We recently highlighted in extensive detail how the move by the short sellers could actually be a huge win for those investors still betting on an AMD turnaround. We named this as our technology stock winner that could potentially double in 2014, and the thesis remains intact.

Estimates are $0.02 EPS (now rounded down rather than up to $0.03, and versus a loss of $0.09 per share a year ago) on a nearly 24% revenue gain to $1.44 billion. AMD shares are now up almost 30% since our early February call that it could double, so for a trading gain to continue in the days after the report it likely has to outperform enough that the cautious analysts have to admit that they were wrong.

Google Inc. (NASDAQ: GOOGL) is expected to report earnings after the close on Thursday. Be advised that this marks the first post-split and dual-class earnings report. Analysts often do not properly account for reorganizations immediately, so we will be spending less time on Google. Our belief is that Google will have to be much higher or much lower than estimates for there to be any major move.

We will be watching Google’s revenue growth, earnings growth, search dominance, and advertisement spending closely. Google’s estimates are $6.26 EPS and $15.6 billion in revenue. Google shares are up 5% so far in 2014. Perhaps Google’s next massive opportunity is that sub-$100 smartphone for the rest of the emerging market world not yet connected.

International Business Machines Corp. (NYSE: IBM) is due share its results Thursday after the close. IBM may not seem important any longer due to no growth, but Big Blue remains massive. Its stock price is among the top DJIA stocks, so it is one of the three most important DJIA stocks by weighting. We are watching closely to see how the company refers to its dead-set $20 EPS target by the end of 2015, hoping for a post-2015 view of the company. We gave our own synopsis after Barron’s talked the stock up. Earnings estimates are $4.29 per share on $24.13 billion in revenue. IBM shares are up just over 2% so far in 2014.

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As a final reminder, these estimates can change literally in the day or hours before the formal earnings report. That is particularly true when one major player is way above or way under the mark. Company reports from Microsoft, Apple, Amazon and many other key stocks will be due in the coming week.

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