FLIR Systems (FLIR) To Report Q1 Earnings: What's In Store?

FLIR Systems Inc. (NASDAQ:FLIR) is set to report first-quarter 2019 financial results on Apr 24, before market open. In the trailing four quarters, the company came up with average positive earnings surprise of 6.80%.

Let's take a closer look at the factors influencing FLIR Systems’ quarterly results.

Factors to Consider

Frequent product innovations and bookings leading to solid organic revenue growth usually provide a boost to the company’s top line. During the first quarter, FLIR System did not launch large number of products, except its uncooled thermal camera designed for detecting methane. Lack of notable innovations might hurt the company’s top line in the quarter to be reported.

Moreover, on its fourth earnings call, the company announced that the government shut down has every possibility of impacting its first-quarter revenues. In line with this, the Zacks Consensus Estimate for first-quarter revenues, pegged at $439 million, indicates a year over year slip of 0.2%. This projection is near the company’s expectation of witnessing flat year over year revenues in the soon-to-be-reported quarter.

FLIR Systems consistently banks on acquisitions and strategic investments to boost its core and non-core businesses. In January, the company acquired Aeryon Labs — a leading developer of high-performance unmanned aerial systems (UAS) — for $200 million. FLIR Systems also completed the acquisition of Endeavor Robotic Holdings — a leading developer of battle-tested, tactical unmanned ground vehicles (UGVs) — for $382 million, in March. Such earnings accretive investments are expected to continue driving FLIR Systems' bottom line in the first quarter.

Considering such developments, the consensus mark for the company’s first-quarter earnings is pegged at 49 cents represents year-over- year increase of 2.1%.

Earnings Whispers

Our proven model does not conclusively show that FLIR Systems is likely to beat on earnings in first-quarter 2019. This is because a stock needs to have both — a positive Earnings ESP and a Zacks Rank #1 (Strong Buy), 2 (Buy) or 3 (Hold) — for this to happen. This is not the case here, as you see below.

Earnings ESP: FLIR Systems has an Earnings ESP of 0.00%. You can uncover the best stocks to buy or sell before they’re reported with our Earnings ESP Filter.

Zacks Rank: FLIR Systems currently carries a Zacks Rank #3.

Note that we caution against stocks with a Zacks Rank #4 or 5 (Sell rated) going into the earnings announcement, especially when the company is seeing negative estimate revisions.

Stocks That Warrant a Look

Here are some companies in the Zacks Aerospace sector that you may want to consider as our model shows that these have the right combination of elements to post an earnings beat this quarter:

Raytheon Company (NYSE:RTN) is scheduled to report first-quarter 2019 results on Apr 25. The company has an Earnings ESP of +1.05% and a Zacks Rank #2. You can see the complete list of today’s Zacks #1 Rank stocks here.

Huntington Ingalls Industries, Inc. (NYSE:HII) is set to report first-quarter 2019 results on May 2. The company has an Earnings ESP of +4.63% and a Zacks Rank #3.

General Dynamics Corp. (NYSE:GD) is scheduled to report first-quarter 2019 results on Apr 24. The company has an Earnings ESP of +1.35% and a Zacks Rank #3.

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