Facebook Q1 earnings preview: Profits of $1.75 per share anticipated

Facebook Inc is expected to show a decrease in its first quarter earnings to $1.75 per share according to the mean Refinitiv estimate from forty analysts. Wall Street expects results to range from $1.37 to $2.08 per share.

RECOMMENDATIONS
The consensus recommendation for the company is "Buy". This includes seventeen "Strong Buy", twenty seven "Buy", five "Hold", two "Sell", one "Strong Sell".


The average consensus recommendation for the online services peer group is also "Buy".

FORECAST CHANGES
Forty four analysts are currently providing Refinitiv with estimates.

In the last week five analysts have negatively revised earnings estimates and there have been no positive earnings revisions. There were no changes to the number of estimates.

In the last four weeks the earnings per share estimate has fallen by 6.35 percent from $1.87. Estimates ranged from a high of $2.22 to a low of $1.62. There has been no changes to the number of estimates.

The StarMine predicted earnings surprise is is too low to be considered statistically significant. Predicted revenue surprise is too low to be significant.

The average price target from the forty four analysts providing estimates is $218.15.

YEAR OVER YEAR
The company is expected to report a rise in revenue to $17.5 billion from $15.08 billion in the same quarter last year.

The current quarter consensus estimate of $1.75 per share implies a loss of 7.57 percent from the same quarter last year when the company reported $1.89 per share.