Xcel Energy (XEL) Q3 earnings and revenue estimates miss estimates

Xcel Energy (XEL) reported quarterly earnings of $1.25 per share, missing the Zacks Consensus Estimate of $1.29 per share. This compares to earnings of $1.23 per share a year ago. These figures are adjusted for one-time items.

This quarterly report represents an earnings surprise of -3.10%. A quarter ago, it was expected that this utility would post earnings of $0.55 per share when it actually produced earnings of $0.54, which corresponds to a surprise of -1.82%.

Over the last four quarters, the company has topped consensus EPS estimates just once.

Xcel, which belongs to the Zacks Utility – Electric Power industry, reported revenues of $3.64 billion for the quarter ended September 2024, missing the Zacks Consensus Estimate by 8.12%. This compares to year-ago sales of $3.66 billion. The company failed to beat consensus revenue estimates in the last four quarters.

The sustainability of the stock's immediate price movement based on the recently-released numbers and future earnings expectations will mostly depend on management's commentary on the earnings release.

Xcel shares have gained about 1.8% since the beginning of the year, while the S&P 500 has gained 21.9%.

While Xcel has underperformed the market so far this year, the question that comes to investors' minds is: what's next for the stock?

There are no easy answers to this key question, but one reliable measure that can help investors address this is the company's earnings outlook. Not only does this include current consensus earnings expectations for the coming quarters, but also how these expectations have changed lately.

Empirical research shows a strong correlation between near-term stock movements and trends in earnings estimate revisions. Investors can track such revisions by themselves or rely on a tried-and-tested rating tool like the Zacks Rank, which has an impressive track record of harnessing the power of earnings estimate revisions.

Ahead of this earnings release, the estimate revision trend for Xcel is: Mixed. While the magnitude and direction of estimate revisions could change following the company's just-released earnings report, the current status results in a Zacks Rank #3 (Hold) for the stock. The shares are therefore expected to perform in line with the market in the near future. You can see the complete list of today's Zacks #1 Rank (Strong Buy) stocks here.

It will be interesting to see how estimates for the coming quarters and current fiscal year change in the coming days. The current consensus EPS estimate is $0.85 on revenue of $3.8 billion for the coming quarter and $3.55 on revenue of $14.48 billion for the current financial year.

The story continues