CVS Caremark Expected to Post Higher Q4 Profit

Posted Feb 7th 2010 3:40PM by Trey Thoelcke
Filed under: Earnings Reports, Forecasts, CVS Corp (CVS)

CVS Caremark Corp. (CVS), the largest retail pharmacy chain in the U.S., is scheduled to discuss its fourth-quarter financial results in a conference call Monday, Feb. 8, at 8:30 AM (ET). An audio webcast of the call will be available at the company's website.

During the three months that ended in December, CVS announced share buybacks, named a new head of HR and provided H1N1 flu shots nationwide. Analysts surveyed by Thomson Reuters are looking for earnings for that period of $0.78 per share. That compares with $0.65 per share in the previous quarter and $0.70 per share a year ago. Revenue for the fourth quarter is expected to be 8.6% higher than a year ago to $26.2 billion.

For the full year, analysts expect to see earnings of $2.63 per share (+7.2%) on $99.1 billion (+13.3%) in revenue. CVS earnings have been in line with estimates in recent quarters.

This Rhode Island-based company's long-term EPS growth forecast of 12.0% is better than that of competitors Rite Aid Corp. (RAD) and Wal-Mart Stores Inc. (WMT). CVS's earnings multiple is 11x, which is less than the retail average. The consensus recommendation has been to buy CVS for more than 90 days, and the mean price target is $37.06. Karen Finerman called CVS her best idea for 2010.

Shares have fallen about 8% in the past few weeks and closed the week at $31.07.

Tags: CVS Caremark, earnings preview, RAD, Rite Aid, Wal-Mart, Walmart, WMT