Earnings Preview: BioLife Solutions

BioLife Solutions BLFS announces its next round of earnings this Thursday, May 13. Here is Benzinga's everything-that-matters guide for this Thursday's Q1 earnings announcement.

Net Income, Earnings, And Earnings Per Share

Earnings and especially earnings per share (EPS) are useful measures of a company's profitability. Total earnings, which is also referred to as net income, equals total revenue minus total expenses. EPS equals to net income divided by the number of shares outstanding.

Earnings And Revenue

Wall Street expects an EPS loss of $0.04 and sales around $16.05 million. BioLife Solutions earnings in the same period a year ago was $0.06 per share. Quarterly sales came in at $12.16 million.

Why Analyst Estimates And Earnings Surprises Are Important

Analysts who cover this company will publish forward-looking estimates of its revenue and EPS each quarter. Averaging together every EPS and revenue prediction that each analyst makes about a company in a quarter yields the "consensus estimates." A company posting earnings or revenue above or below the consensus estimate is known as an "earnings surprise" and may move the stock by a considerable margin.

The analyst consensus estimate would represent a 166.67% decrease in the company's earnings. Revenue would be up 31.97% from the same quarter last year. Here is how the company's reported EPS has stacked up against analyst estimates in the past:

Stock Performance

Shares of BioLife Solutions were trading at $31.67 as of May 11. Over the last 52-week period, shares are up 113.32%. Given that these returns are generally positive, long-term shareholders can be satisfied going into this earnings release.

Do not be surprised to see the stock move on comments made during its conference call. BioLife Solutions is scheduled to hold the call at 16:30:00 ET and can be accessed here.