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Tenet Healthcare (THC) Q1 Earnings: Disappointment in Store?

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Tenet Healthcare Corporation (THC - Free Report) will release fourth-quarter 2016 results on May 2, after the market closes. Last quarter, the company posted a negative earnings surprise of 7.5%. Let’s see how things are shaping up for this announcement.

Factors to be Considered this Quarter

Tenet Healthcare’s hospitals and ambulatory operations on a same-store basis are likely to deliver strong results. This is mainly due to increased demand for higher acuity services, which is expected to have significantly added to the revenues.

The Conifer segment is likely to display solid performance on the back ofkey contract wins and expansion of existing relationships.

USPI's surgery centers and surgical hospitals are also anticipated to have contributed significantly to revenue growth.

However, discontinuation of the ACA Exchange product might have affected membership growth in the quarter.

Moreover, increasing trend in malpractices and workers' compensation expenses is likely to have limited bottom-line growth.

The company’s business is also likely to have been affected by catastrophic events in the quarter.

Earnings Whispers

Our proven model does not conclusively show whether Tenet Healthcare is likely to beat on earnings this quarter. This is because a stock needs to have both a positive Earnings ESP and a Zacks Rank #1 (Strong Buy), 2 (Buy) or 3 (Hold) for this to happen. That is not the case here as you will see below.

Zacks ESP: Tenet Healthcare has an Earnings ESP of -7.55%. This is because the Most Accurate estimate stands at a loss of 57 cents, whereas the Zacks Consensus Estimate is pegged at a loss of 53 cents. You can uncover the best stocks to buy or sell before they’re reported with our Earnings ESP Filter.

Zacks Rank: Tenet Healthcare carries a Zacks Rank #5 (Strong Sell).

As it is, we caution against Sell-rated stocks (Zacks Rank #4 or 5) going into the earnings announcement, especially when the company is seeing negative estimate revisions.

Stocks to Consider

Here are some other companies from the medical sector that you may want to consider as these have the right combination of elements to post an earnings beat this quarter:

Humana, Inc. (HUM), which is set to report first-quarter earnings on May 3, has an Earnings ESP of +2.78% and a Zacks Rank #3. You can see the complete list of today’s Zacks #1 Rank stocks here.

Molina Healthcare, Inc.(MOH) has an Earnings ESP of +1.75% and a Zacks Rank #3. The company is set to report first-quarter earnings also on May 4.

Alliqua BioMedical, Inc. (ALQA) has an Earnings ESP of +33.33% and a Zacks Rank #3 The company is set to report first-quarter earnings on May 9.

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