Earnings Previews

Autoliv enters its third-quarter report with a full-year promise that leans heavily on the final three months of the year. Last quarter, management kept its 10.5% to 11% adjusted operating margin target even after cutting its global light vehicle production outlook and raising its raw-material cost estimate again. It also acknowledged that the path to that target is no longer linear. Third-quarter margins are expected to look roughly like the first half, and a significant step-up is required in the fourth quarter. That makes the October 23 release, due before the open, less a test of the headline number and more a test of whether the setup for that year-end surge still looks credible.

American Express heads into its third-quarter report with an awkward split. Management sounded more confident three months ago than it has in years, lifting its revenue outlook and saying it could afford to spend more on growth than planned. The stock has fallen 5.9% since then, while the S&P 500 gained 4.2%. Either the market is doubting that confidence, or it is overlooking a business that keeps compounding. The October 23 release, due before the open, should help show which.

Booz Allen Hamilton enters its fiscal second-quarter report with an unusual mix of improving signals and shrinking numbers. Last quarter, funding, bookings and funded backlog all turned sharply higher after a punishing fiscal 2026, and margins hit their best level in more than a year. Revenue, however, kept falling, and management warned that civil sales would drop by double digits sequentially this quarter. The question for the October 23 report is whether the order book recovery is real enough to outweigh a quarter that management has already told the Street will look worse.

Balchem heads into its third-quarter report with its strongest top-line momentum in more than a year and a lingering question about how much of that growth is actually reaching the bottom line. Last quarter the company set records for revenue, adjusted EBITDA and adjusted earnings, powered by a sharp turn in Animal Nutrition & Health. Gross margin, however, barely budged, rising just 10 basis points to 36.5% as manufacturing input costs tied to the Middle East conflict ate into the benefit of higher volumes and better mix. The upcoming report should show whether that squeeze was a temporary speed bump or the start of a tougher cost environment.

GrafTech heads into its third-quarter report with a story that has improved faster than its financials. Last quarter management traded the grim language of late 2025 for a far more confident message: steel demand is firming across regions, a price increase is holding, and trade protection is arriving on both sides of the Atlantic. The catch is timing. Nearly all of this year's volume was locked in at fourth-quarter 2025 prices, so the good news is largely a 2027 event. That leaves this report to answer a narrower question: can the company stretch its shrinking cushion of cash long enough to collect?

First Citizens BancShares delivered its most confident quarter in a year last time out, yet the stock has gone the other way. Shares have slipped 4.4% since the July report while the S&P 500 gained 4.1%. That gap frames the October 23 release as a credibility test. Was the second quarter's jump to $57.09 in adjusted EPS the start of a durable upswing, or a one-time lift from reserve releases and investment gains that the market has already discounted?

First Hawaiian heads into its third-quarter report with an odd disconnect. Management spent the last call raising its net interest margin outlook for the third straight quarter and unveiling the Trico Bancshares acquisition as a bold move to the West Coast, yet the stock has dropped 13.9% since then while the S&P 500 gained 4.2%. The core business appears to be improving, but the market seems to be pricing in the cost and risk of the deal. This report is the first real chance to show whether the improving momentum can hold up under that pressure.

Flagstar Financial heads into its third-quarter report with a split personality. The operating business looks better than it has in years, with record commercial and industrial lending, the first balance-sheet growth since late 2023 and a maiden $250 million buyback. Yet management has cut its earnings outlook three quarters running, and the stock has fallen 22% since the last report while the S&P 500 gained about 4%. The question for October 23 is simple: is the turnaround merely running late, or is the destination moving?

Gentex delivered the best quarter in its recent history last time out, and the stock has fallen more than 10% since. That disconnect frames the third-quarter report, due before the open on October 23. Management walked away from the summer call sounding more confident than it has in years. It raised its gross margin outlook and promised a first contract manufacturing award. The market has treated the record results as a one-off flattered by a tariff refund. This report should show which reading is closer to the truth.

Gorman-Rupp heads into its third-quarter report with a curious disconnect. Wall Street is penciling in earnings growth of nearly 29% from a year ago, yet the stock has slid almost 9% since the company last reported while the S&P 500 climbed about 4%. That gap of roughly 13 percentage points suggests the market is less convinced than the analyst models that the pump maker's profit momentum will hold. The report, due before the opening bell on October 23, should go a long way toward settling which side has it right.

Three months ago, Infosys traded its habit of raising guidance for a more defensive posture, trimming the top of its fiscal 2027 outlook as a client program termination, a shrinking European manufacturing account and heavier AI-driven pricing pressure ate into the legacy business. The upcoming report, due before the open on October 23, is the first real check on whether that reset was a one-time clearing of the decks or the start of a longer slide in organic growth. The stock's rebound since the last report suggests investors have chosen the more charitable reading.

Last quarter, Preferred Bank largely put its biggest problem behind it. The troubled nine-loan relationship that had dominated the prior two calls was mostly resolved, provisions fell to almost nothing and earnings beat the bank's own budget. The harder question for the third-quarter report, due before the open on October 23, is whether the bank can hold its earning power once the credit relief is in the rear-view mirror and funding costs start working against it.

Rogers Communications heads into its third-quarter report with a stock that has already absorbed a good deal of bad news. Shares have fallen 7.2% since the company last reported, while the S&P 500 gained 3.1%. That gap of roughly 10 percentage points means the market has spent the past three months marking Rogers down rather than waiting for proof. The question for October 23 is whether the numbers justify that pessimism or show the selling went too far.

Rithm Capital enters its third-quarter report with an awkward contrast. Management spent the last call describing a company finally hitting its stride, with nearly every division showing better numbers. Yet the stock has fallen about 10.6% since then, trailing the S&P 500 by nearly 15 percentage points. The gap suggests the market cares less about segment momentum than about the figure that sits beneath it all: core earnings per share, which have been drifting quietly lower.

Three months ago, SLB's management sounded more confident than it had in a year, describing a market that was starting to look like an upcycle and doubling its data center ambitions. The stock has not cooperated. Shares have slipped 3.1% since that report while the S&P 500 gained 4.2%, leaving SLB trading near the bottom of its post-earnings range and below its 200-day moving average. The third-quarter report, due before the open on October 23, is where the company has to show that the optimism was grounded in operations and not just tone.

AB Volvo delivered a strong second quarter, yet the stock has fallen since. Shares have slipped 8.4% since that report while the S&P 500 gained 3.7%, a gap of roughly 12 percentage points. The October 23 report, due before the open, will help show which side is right: the market, which seems to doubt those gains will last, or the company, which still has to show the momentum carried into the second half.

World Acceptance enters its fiscal second-quarter report with a credit story that keeps getting better and a growth story that has gone quiet. Charge-offs and delinquencies have improved for several quarters running, but the last call came with almost no financial detail, a third leader at the microphone in four quarters, and a decision to start loosening underwriting even as gas prices squeeze the company's core borrowers. This report is the first full quarter of that looser credit box, and it should show whether management's renewed appetite for growth was well timed.

Alliance Resource Partners spent its last earnings call making a confident case that the hard part was behind it: coal costs were falling fast, a major longwall was back in service, and a $206 million minerals acquisition had just closed. The third-quarter report, due before the open on October 26, is the first chance to see whether that story shows up in a full quarter of numbers rather than in management's forward-looking commentary.

Last quarter Business First Bancshares finally delivered the numbers behind a story management had been telling for several quarters. Core net interest margin widened, nonperforming loans fell sharply and the watch list shrank. The third-quarter report, due before the open on October 26, is where investors learn whether that was the start of a trend or a single good quarter. It also carries the noise of the Progressive systems conversion, which was scheduled for August 10. That makes this a busy quarter to read cleanly.

Bank of Marin Bancorp heads into its third-quarter report with an awkward split between what the business has been doing and what the stock has been doing. Since the last report, management has described a bank whose earnings engine is clearly mending. The margin is widening, credit cleanup is largely done and capital is rebuilding. Yet the shares have fallen 11.4% while the S&P 500 gained 2.5%. The report, due before the open on October 26, has to show which story deserves more weight.

Bank of Hawaii heads into its third-quarter report with an odd disconnect. Management has delivered nine straight quarters of net interest margin expansion and reaffirmed a path to roughly 2.90% by year-end. Yet the stock has fallen about 19% since the last report, trailing the S&P 500 by nearly 22 percentage points. The October 26 release, due before the open, needs to show whether the margin story is still intact or whether the market has correctly sniffed out trouble in deposits and credit.

Wall Street is asking Cemex to deliver one of its strongest years of earnings growth in recent memory, yet the stock is trading as if something has gone wrong. Shares have fallen about 21% since the company last reported, while the S&P 500 gained roughly 3%. That leaves the cement and building materials producer with a striking gap between what analysts expect from the income statement and what the market seems willing to pay for it. The third-quarter report, due before the opening bell on October 26, should show which side has it right.

Three months ago, Easterly Government Properties told investors it was nearing an inflection point. A rising share price, management argued, would finally let the company start converting a $1.5 billion acquisition and development pipeline that has sat largely idle while the balance sheet was repaired. The market has since moved the other way. The stock has fallen 13.6% since the last report, trailing the S&P 500 by more than 15 percentage points, and at $21.82 it sits at the bottom of its post-earnings range and well below its 200-day moving average of $23.53. That leaves the third-quarter report with an awkward job: proving that the operating story is intact even as the cost-of-capital story that was supposed to unlock growth has slipped out of reach.

HBT Financial enters its third-quarter report with a puzzle. The Bloomington, Illinois lender earned $0.78 a share last quarter on revenue of $100.4 million. Analysts now expect the same $0.78 in profit on just $82.6 million in revenue. A bank that keeps earnings flat while the top line falls by roughly a sixth is either carrying lumpy items in its reported revenue or showing unusually firm control of costs and credit. This report should help clarify which one it is.

Lakeland Financial heads into its third-quarter report with an awkward mix of modest expectations and growing pessimism. Wall Street expects the Indiana lender to earn less than it did last quarter, sentiment has soured sharply, and the stock has drifted below its long-term trend line. That combination lowers the bar in one sense. It also raises the stakes for any sign that the earnings softening is more than a one-quarter blip.

Medifast has spent the past few quarters asking investors to look past a shrinking top line and focus on the quality of its remaining coach network. Its third-quarter report, due before the open on October 26, is where that argument has to start showing up in the numbers. Under new CEO Nick Johnson, management has promised a return to profitability in the fourth quarter. That leaves this report as the last checkpoint before the promise comes due.

MakeMyTrip heads into its fiscal second-quarter report with a business that looks healthier than its share price suggests, and that gap is the story. Last quarter, management showed that hotels, buses, cabs and ancillaries could carry roughly 20% constant-currency growth even as air ticketing went from growth leader to drag. The market was not persuaded. The stock has fallen about 26% since that report while the S&P 500 edged higher, so this release is less about whether MakeMyTrip can grow and more about whether it can show that growth reaching the bottom line again.

Verizon's turnaround has been running on two very different engines. Profitability, churn and capital returns have improved quickly under Dan Schulman, enough for management to raise its outlook early in the year. Reported service revenue, however, has lagged, weighed down by outage credits, promotional costs and tough pricing comparisons. When the carrier reports before the bell on October 26, the central question is whether the top line is finally starting to support the bottom-line story.

For a company whose fate rests on a single Phase 2 readout due within weeks, Acumen Pharmaceuticals' third-quarter report is less about the loss per share and more about two things: whether the late-2026 Altitude AD timeline is still intact, and how much cash will be left when the answer arrives. The stock has lost more than a quarter of its value since the last report, so the market is clearly nervous about one or both.

Agilysys raised its full-year forecast only two months after setting it, and that confidence carries a built-in challenge. Subscription revenue grew 26.1% in the first quarter, yet management now promises at least 32% growth for fiscal 2027. That math only works if subscription growth climbs well above 32% in the quarters ahead, so the fiscal second-quarter report due after the close on October 26 is the first real test of whether the acceleration is arriving on schedule.

Amkor Technology heads into its third-quarter report with an odd disconnect. Three months ago management delivered record revenue, a sharply higher margin outlook and two landmark partnerships with TSMC and NVIDIA. Since then the stock has dropped 19.3%, trailing the S&P 500 by more than 22 percentage points. The report due after the close on October 26 is the first real chance to show whether the improving story on the conference call is turning into actual earnings, or whether the market's skepticism has a basis.

Alexandria Real Estate Equities heads into its third-quarter report with an unusual split between what management said and what the market has done. Last quarter's call had a clearly improving tone, with leasing up 60% from the first quarter, more tenants in the market and free rent concessions easing. Yet the stock has fallen nearly 20% since then while the S&P 500 was roughly flat. The report due after the close on October 26 has to show whether the operating recovery is real enough to outweigh asset sales running late and impairments that may not be finished.

Avidbank Holdings heads into its third-quarter report with an awkward math problem. Management spent last quarter's call promising faster balance-sheet growth in the back half of the year while warning that its net interest margin could slip further. Wall Street has nonetheless penciled in a sizable earnings jump. Squaring those two ideas is the whole story when the Palo Alto lender reports after the close on October 26.

Brown & Brown heads into its third-quarter report with a story that sounds better than its headline numbers. Management struck a noticeably more confident tone last quarter, pointing to inflecting retail sales, stronger contingent commissions and a slate of named AI partnerships. Yet the company's core organic growth, excluding contingents, was still negative at minus 0.7%, a long way from the +3.5% it posted a year earlier. This report is where the second-half recovery management sketched out either starts showing up in the numbers or gets pushed further down the road.

Brixmor Property Group heads into its third-quarter report with an odd disconnect. Management spent the last call raising guidance, touting the strongest tenant credit in company history and pointing to a record backlog of signed leases. The stock has responded by falling 13% since that report, trailing the S&P 500 by more than 16 percentage points. Either the market sees something the operating numbers have not yet shown, or the shares have drifted away from fundamentals that are still improving. Monday's release, due after the close on October 26, should help settle which story is closer to the truth.

Three months ago Cadence Design Systems delivered the largest single-quarter lift to its annual revenue outlook in company history, and the stock has drifted lower anyway. That disconnect frames the third-quarter report due after the close on October 26. Management has spent 2026 steadily ratcheting up its forecast, and now it has to show that the acceleration in intellectual property and system design was a durable trend rather than a well-timed burst, all while deliberately spending more in the back half of the year.

Cincinnati Financial heads into its third-quarter report with a split personality. Its investment portfolio keeps compounding at a double-digit clip and book value just hit a record, yet the insurance business that is supposed to anchor the story slipped into an underwriting loss last quarter. The Street is betting that the second-quarter stumble was mostly bad luck. This report, due after the close on October 26, will show whether that bet holds.

Celestica heads into its third-quarter report with an unusual mismatch. The business has rarely looked stronger, with management raising its full-year outlook for the fourth consecutive time and saying 2027 growth should top this year's pace. Yet the stock has slipped 7.4% since the last report while the S&P 500 gained 3.3%. The October 26 release, due after the close, is a test of whether a near-flawless operating story can win back a market that has started to hesitate.

For four straight quarters, Clearwater Paper's management talked about weathering a supply-driven downturn in solid bleached sulfate paperboard. Last quarter the language changed to recovery. When the company reports third-quarter results after the close on October 26, investors will find out whether that shift was a real turn in the cycle or just a hopeful forecast. Management guided to third-quarter EBITDA of $20 million to $30 million, a sharp reversal from the negative $8 million posted in the second quarter. It was the first clearly positive guide after a run of breakeven-to-negative outlooks.

Custom Truck One Source enters its third-quarter report with an odd disconnect. Management has raised its full-year outlook twice, described utility transmission spending as a possible once-in-a-generation super cycle, and kept cutting leverage. Yet the stock has fallen nearly 23% since the last report while the S&P 500 was roughly flat. The quarter now has to show whether the guided sequential slowdown is just a timing quirk, or whether the market sensed something the company's upbeat tone missed.

Dorman Products enters its third-quarter report with a question that one-time gains can no longer answer. Last quarter's record earnings were flattered by a tariff refund, while the real news was a sharply lower sales outlook as the company returns tariff savings to customers through lower prices. Management argued that those price cuts, along with new-category business wins landing in the back half, would revive unit growth. This report is the first real test of that claim.

Flexsteel Industries enters its fiscal first-quarter report with a record year behind it and a noticeably more cautious story in front of it. The furniture maker closed fiscal 2026 with record adjusted earnings and more than $47 million of free cash flow, yet management spent much of its last call explaining why momentum was fading. Sales growth slowed to under 1% in the fourth quarter, the operating margin outlook stepped down, and demand softened after the Iran conflict began. The question now is whether that slowdown was a pause or the start of a longer squeeze.

Five Star Bancorp spent its last report showing that it can grow very fast. Loans expanded at a 29% annualized pace in the second quarter, more than double the rate of the prior period, and the bank raised fresh equity to keep that momentum going. The third-quarter report will show what that growth costs. The bank now has to prove that a larger balance sheet, a bigger share count and a push into Southern California can produce earnings growth instead of thinner margins.

FirstSun Capital Bancorp enters its third-quarter report with a split personality. The mechanics of the First Foundation acquisition are running ahead of plan, with faster cost savings, smaller book value dilution and a finished balance sheet overhaul. Yet last quarter's two outsized commercial charge-offs pushed the company to a net loss and nearly doubled its full-year credit loss outlook. The report due after the close on October 26 is the first chance to see whether that damage was a contained event or the start of a longer slog.

Greenbrier heads into its fiscal fourth-quarter report with a split personality. On one side sits a railcar builder that has squeezed better margins out of trough volumes and quietly built a much larger leasing business. On the other sits a backlog that has fallen every quarter to its lowest level in more than a decade, and a full-year earnings forecast that management has cut three times. The October 26 release, due after the close, will show which of those stories carries more weight as the company closes out fiscal 2026.

Gerdau heads into its third-quarter report with an unusual mix of confidence and caution baked into the setup. Last quarter, management sounded more upbeat than it had in a long while, pointing to two early-August US price increases on special steel and beams that were not included in its outlook. Yet the same call also flagged a one-off charge of roughly R$150 million tied to idling the Midlothian melt shop this quarter. The report due after the close on October 26 is the first real chance to see which of those forces wins.

For several quarters The Hartford sold investors a simple story: superb small-business margins, a healed personal auto book, and casualty reserves that stayed quiet while peers took charges. Last quarter that last pillar wobbled. The insurer added $46 million to general liability reserves, mostly excess casualty and umbrella across multiple accident years, and $26 million to commercial auto on rising severity and attorney involvement. When the company reports third-quarter results after the close on October 26, the central question is whether those additions were a contained cleanup or the opening chapter of a longer casualty problem.

H2O America heads into its third-quarter report with a stock that has drifted toward the bottom of its recent range even as the company edges toward the biggest transaction in its history. That disconnect frames the release, due after the close on October 26. Management has spent a year arguing that its earnings power is growing faster than the per-share figures suggest, and the summer quarter, typically the strongest of the year for a water utility, is the best chance to prove it.

Hawkins heads into its September-quarter report with an awkward mix of solid expected growth and a stock that has lost the market's confidence. Wall Street is looking for earnings to rise faster than revenue, which points to operating leverage. Yet shares have slipped since the last report while the broader market climbed. That gap between steady fundamentals and a souring mood makes this release a referendum on whether Hawkins can still turn incremental sales into outsized profit.

Kforce heads into its third-quarter report with a curious disconnect. Last quarter management delivered its best sequential revenue growth in roughly four years and said outright that a cyclical staffing recovery was underway. Since then, the stock has slid nearly 10% while the S&P 500 gained about 3%. The upcoming release, due after the close on October 26, needs to show whether that upturn is gathering strength or whether the market's skepticism has a point.