What's in the Cards for Loews (L) This Earnings Season?

Loews Corporation L is slated to report fourth-quarter 2019 results on Feb 10, before market open. The company delivered positive earnings surprise in two of the last four reported quarters.

Let’s see how things have shaped up for this announcement.

Better performance at CNA Financial CNA , Loews Hotels and Boardwalk Pipeline are likely to have aided Loews’ fourth-quarter performance.

CNA Financial’s fourth-quarter premiums are likely to have benefited from increase in new business, renewal premium change, rate increase and solid retention. This, in turn, may have driven Loews' performance as it has a stake in CNA Financial.

A not-so-active catastrophe environment is expected to have aided underwriting results. Its Life & Group unit is anticipated to have benefited from favorable persistency.

Loews Hotel is expected to have performed well given solid performance across its properties. However, pre-opening expenses in connection to new hotels might drain margins.

Boardwalk Pipeline, Loews’ subsidiary, is likely to have benefited from growth-enhancing projects and transportation storage of natural gas liquids.

Diamond Offshore’s DO , in which Loews has a stake, performance is likely to have been hurt by lower day rate, drop in contract drilling revenues, higher drilling expense and a decline in rigs working. Loews' results are also expected to reflect challenging conditions in the global offshore drilling market.

Sustained share buybacks are likely to have boosted the bottom line.

The Zacks Consensus Estimate for fourth-quarter earnings is pegged at 72 cents, implying 100% growth from the year-ago reported figure.

What Our Quantitative Model Predicts

Our proven model does not predict an earnings beat for Loews this time around. The combination of a positive Earnings ESP and a Zacks Rank #1 (Strong Buy), 2 (Buy) or 3 (Hold) increases the odds of an earnings beat. But this is not the case here as you can see below.

Earnings ESP: Loews has an Earnings ESP of 0.00%. This is because both the Most Accurate Estimate and the Zacks Consensus Estimate are pegged at 75 cents. You can uncover the best stocks to buy or sell before they’re reported with our Earnings ESP Filter.

Zacks Rank: Loews carries a Zacks Rank #4.

Stock to Consider   

Here’s a stock from the insurance industry with the perfect mix of elements to surpass estimates this time around:

American International Group, Inc. AIG has an Earnings ESP of +3.7%. The company carries a Zacks Rank of 3.

You can see the complete list of today’s Zacks #1 Rank stocks here.

Just Released: Zacks’ 7 Best Stocks for Today

Experts extracted 7 stocks from the list of 220 Zacks Rank #1 Strong Buys that has beaten the market more than 2X over with a stunning average gain of +24.7% per year.

These 7 were selected because of their superior potential for immediate breakout.

See these time-sensitive tickers now >>

Want the latest recommendations from Zacks Investment Research? Today, you can download 7 Best Stocks for the Next 30 Days. Click to get this free report
 
American International Group, Inc. (AIG) : Free Stock Analysis Report
 
Loews Corporation (L) : Free Stock Analysis Report
 
CNA Financial Corporation (CNA) : Free Stock Analysis Report
 
Diamond Offshore Drilling, Inc. (DO) : Free Stock Analysis Report
 
To read this article on Zacks.com click here.
 
Zacks Investment Research