Given last week's news that new home sales have plunged and that new home prices continue to fall, what is Wall Street expecting from homebuilders Centex Corp. (NYSE: CTX), Pulte Homes Inc. (NYSE: PHM), and DR Horton Inc. (NYSE: DHI) when they report quarterly results this week?
Analysts surveyed by Thomson Reuters anticipate that Dallas-based Centex will report that it narrowed its net loss in its fiscal third quarter to $3.27 per share. In the same period of last year, the loss was $7.94 per share. Revenue in the third quarter is expected to total $895.3 million, down 53.0% from last year. For the full year, the loss is expected to reach $7.36 per share on revenue of $4.0 billion, which compares to a $21.69 per share loss on $8.3 billion in sales in 2008. Centex has posted bigger-than-expected losses in the past five quarters. So the consensus recommendation of analysts remains to hold CTX, though the long-range EPS growth forecast is 9.0%. The share price has fallen 20.0% just since the beginning of the year, and it is 70.7% lower than it was a year ago. Centex suspended its quarterly dividends back in October.
Pulte Homes, one of the largest homebuilders in the U.S., is expected to report that it narrowed its net loss as well in its fourth quarter. The projected $0.71 per share loss compares to a $3.54 per-share loss in the same period of last year. Revenue in the recent quarter is expected to come to $1.4 billion, down 50.5% from last year. For the full year, the loss is expected to be $5.02 per share on revenue of $6.1 billion, which compares to a $9.02 per share loss and $9.3 billion in sales in 2007. Pulte has posted bigger-than-expected losses in four of the past five quarters. The long-range EPS growth forecast is 10.0%, and the consensus recommendation of analysts remains to hold PHM. The share price is closer to the 52-week low than the 52-week high and is 35.1% lower than it was a year ago. Pulte has also suspended its quarterly dividends.
Fort Worth, Tex.-based DR Horton, on the other hand, is expected to have widened its net loss by 21.2% from last year to $0.52 per share. Revenue for the fiscal first quarter is forecast to be $918.2 million, which is 47.3% lower than last year. So far, the full-year loss is expected to come to $1.27 per share on revenue of $3.9 billion, which compares to a $8.34 per share loss and $6.7 billion in revenue in 2008. DR Horton has posted bigger-than-expected losses in the past four quarters. The long-range EPS growth forecast is only 7.6%, and, no surprise, the consensus recommendation remains to hold DHI. The share price has fallen 19.2% in the past three months, and shares are 65.6% lower than it was a year ago.
Entrepreneur's Journal: Putting together a solid sales contract
The week in preview: Earnings from Walmart, Macy's, and other retailers
Six top trades for the rest of 2009
Reader Comments (Page 1 of 1)
2-02-2009 @ 12:57AM
BHarrison said...
In south Florida we are dealing with a minimum of a two to three year "surplus" of BOTH residential, condo, and commercial buidlings . . . which WILL INCREASE throughout 2009.
Congress sold out to the FIs and corporations, thereby allowing a tremendous amount of overconstruction. Now we will have to live with the problems that have been created by this over construction.
One has to wonder what will happen to our qualified tradesmen who will be out of work for several years; and the effective "loss" of both the corporations and personnel who have the training and experience to construct major buildings . . . will our construction trades manage to survive? How will the architects, engineers, and their staffs earn a living?
The damage that has been done by the FIs is incalculable . . . and this is merely the tip of the ice berg. Meanwhile, according to the national news, NINE out of TEN of the CEOs who orchestrated, oversaw, and perpetuated these CRIMES of FRAUD, are still running these corporations. and they still have the ill gotten wealth that they garner via the FRAUDS that they committed.
When is Congress going to have these CRIMINALS indicted and prosecuted . . . and when are they going to seek to have the ill gotten salaries, unwarranted bonuses, and other compensations PAID BACK to the corporations/stock holders?
Congress needs to address these matters expeditiously.
2-02-2009 @ 5:37AM
al coholic said...
Sorry B but the "qualified tradesmen" you refer to have long been absent from homebuilding. Many have gone into the remodeling business or have left the field entirely.
Take a ride through one of these big three's sub-divisions and you can confirm this for yourself, but don't bother trying to talk to any of the workers because they don't speak the language. Pulte, Horton, and Centex have done to quality of construction what Mcdonalds did to nutrition.
Most of these houses won't stand the test of tlime for even a decade, much less the centuries that houses our grandparents parents built have lasted.