A week ago, Excelerate Energy, Inc. (NYSE:EE) came out with a strong set of first-quarter numbers that could potentially lead to a re-rate of the stock. The company beat forecasts, with revenue of US$200m, some 9.4% above estimates, and statutory earnings per share (EPS) coming in at US$0.24, 23% ahead of expectations. Earnings are an important time for investors, as they can track a company's performance, look at what the analysts are forecasting for next year, and see if there's been a change in sentiment towards the company. So we gathered the latest post-earnings forecasts to see what estimates suggest is in store for next year.
Taking into account the latest results, the current consensus, from the six analysts covering Excelerate Energy, is for revenues of US$821.6m in 2024. This implies a disturbing 28% reduction in Excelerate Energy's revenue over the past 12 months. Per-share earnings are expected to increase 2.4% to US$1.20. Yet prior to the latest earnings, the analysts had been anticipated revenues of US$869.8m and earnings per share (EPS) of US$1.09 in 2024. While revenue forecasts have been revised downwards, the analysts look to have become more optimistic on the company's cost base, given the decent improvement in to the earnings per share numbers.
There's been no real change to the average price target of US$22.00, with the lower revenue and higher earnings forecasts not expected to meaningfully impact the company's valuation over a longer timeframe. It could also be instructive to look at the range of analyst estimates, to evaluate how different the outlier opinions are from the mean. Currently, the most bullish analyst values Excelerate Energy at US$26.00 per share, while the most bearish prices it at US$18.00. As you can see, analysts are not all in agreement on the stock's future, but the range of estimates is still reasonably narrow, which could suggest that the outcome is not totally unpredictable.
Taking a look at the bigger picture now, one of the ways we can understand these forecasts is to see how they compare to both past performance and industry growth estimates. One thing that stands out from these estimates is that shrinking revenues are expected to moderate over the period ending 2024 compared to the historical decline of 45% per annum over the past year. By contrast, our data suggests that other companies (with analyst coverage) in a similar industry are forecast to see their revenue grow 2.1% per year. So while a broad number of companies are forecast to grow, unfortunately Excelerate Energy is expected to see its revenue affected worse than other companies in the industry.
The Bottom Line
The most important thing here is that the analysts upgraded their earnings per share estimates, suggesting that there has been a clear increase in optimism towards Excelerate Energy following these results. On the negative side, they also downgraded their revenue estimates, and forecasts imply they will perform worse than the wider industry. Even so, earnings per share are more important to the intrinsic value of the business. The consensus price target held steady at US$22.00, with the latest estimates not enough to have an impact on their price targets.
With that said, the long-term trajectory of the company's earnings is a lot more important than next year. We have forecasts for Excelerate Energy going out to 2026, and you can see them free on our platform here.
You can also see our analysis of Excelerate Energy's Board and CEO remuneration and experience, and whether company insiders have been buying stock.
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