Factors To Watch Ahead Of Blue Apron's (APRN) Q4 Earnings

Blue Apron Holdings, Inc. (NYSE:APRN) is set to come out with fourth-quarter 2018 results on Jan 31. The bottom line of this provider of recipes and fresh ingredients for convenient home cooking has outperformed the Zacks Consensus Estimate by an average of 19% in the trailing four quarters. Let’s see how things are placed ahead of the upcoming quarterly results.

What to Expect?

The Zacks Consensus Estimate has remained stable in the past 30 days at a loss of 17 cents, which is narrower than a loss of 20 cents reported in the comparable year-ago period. The consensus mark for revenues is $140 million, reflecting a slump of 25.5% from the year-ago quarter.

Factors Impacting Results

Blue Apron is on track with its key strategic priorities, which include strengthening its portfolio of products, improve customer experience and solidify new distribution channels. The company is focused on serving customers better with improved products and digital innovations, alongside boosting efficiency to move toward profitability.

To this end, Blue Apron is making solid efforts to bolster its direct-to-consumer business. Further, the company is committed toward extending channels beyond direct-to-consumer. In this regard, it remains focused on venturing into new retail networks, as well as distribution networks that are more in demand. Also, it remains focused on keeping pace with the evolving preferences and updates its culinary products accordingly. These factors are likely to work in favor of Blue Apron in the quarter to be reported.

Given an improved bottom-line performance in the third-quarter, along with efficient marketing spending and anticipations of sustained operational efficiencies, Blue Apron expects its bottom line to remain favorable in 2018. This clearly gives out positive indications for the quarter under review. However, unproductive revenue is likely to remain a hurdle and dent overall top line and customer count. Incidentally, management expects year-over-year top-line growth for the fourth quarter to be similar to that in the third quarter. In the third quarter, the company recorded a 28% plunge in net revenues owing to lower customer count.

What the Zacks Model Unveils

Our proven model doesn’t show that Blue Apronis likely to beat bottom-line estimates this quarter. For this to happen, a stock needs to have both a positive Earnings ESP and a Zacks Rank #1 (Strong Buy), 2 (Buy) or 3 (Hold). You can uncover the best stocks to buy or sell before they’re reported with our Earnings ESP Filter.

Though Blue Aproncarries a Zacks Rank #1, its Earnings ESP of 0.00% makes surprise prediction difficult. You can see the complete list of today’s Zacks #1 Rank stocks here.

Stocks Poised to Beat Earnings Estimates

Here are some companies you may want to consider, as our model shows that these have the right combination of elements to post earnings beat:

Archer Daniels Midland (NYSE:ADM) , a Zacks #1 Ranked company, has an Earnings ESP of +2.45%. You can see the complete list of today’s Zacks #1 Rank stocks here.

Nomad Foods (NYSE:NOMD) has an Earnings ESP of +1.45% and a Zacks Rank of 2.

Church & Dwight (NYSE:CHD) , a Zacks #2 Ranked stock, has an Earnings ESP of +2.80%.

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