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Forbes Earnings Preview: Hewlett-Packard

This article is more than 10 years old.

Analysts expect decreased profit for Hewlett-Packard (HPQ) when the company reports its second quarter results on Wednesday, May 23, 2012. Although Hewlett-Packard reported profit of $1.24 a year ago, the consensus estimate calls for earnings per share of 91 cents.

What to Expect:

The consensus estimate remains unchanged over the past month, but it has decreased from three months ago when it was 95 cents. Analysts are projecting earnings of $4.02 per share for the fiscal year.

Analysts look for revenue to decrease 5.4% year-over-year to $29.92 billion for the quarter, after being $31.63 billion a year ago. For the year, revenue is projected to come in at $122.44 billion.

Trends to Watch For:

The last two quarters have seen decreases in the company's net income. In the first quarter, net income fell 43.6% from the year earlier quarter, while the figure dropped 90.6% in the fourth quarter of the last fiscal year.

The company has experienced dips in revenue in the last two quarters. In first quarter, revenue was $30.04 billion, 7% lower than the year-ago figure. In the quarter before that, revenue fell 3.5%.

Analyst Ratings:

Analysts have become more optimistic about the stock recently and the number of buy ratings has risen slightly over the past three months.

Competitors:

Hewlett-Packard is a provider of products, technologies, software, solutions and services to individual consumers, small- and medium-sized businesses (SMBs) and large enterprises, including customers in the government, health and education sectors. One of Hewlett-Packard's main competitors in the computers and peripherals industry is Apple (AAPL). Other competitors in the information technology sector include: Dell (DELL), Oracle (ORCL), and Microsoft (MSFT).

Recent Price Movement:

The stock price has fallen 24.5% to $22.06 from $29.20 since February 21, 2012.

Earnings estimates provided by Zacks.

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