Back in March we noted that the company gave its outlook for the 2015 full year. It expects net income per share, on a pro forma basis, to be in the range of $0.67 to $0.71, as well as growth in comparable restaurant sales in the range of 3% to 5% and the restaurant contribution margin of 21.7% to 22.0%. The consensus estimates moved up slightly since then to EPS of $0.70 and $371.26 million in revenue from $0.68 in EPS on revenue of $369.30 million.
The most recent earnings report noted that it was the 15th consecutive quarter with positive comparable restaurant sales growth. In the first quarter, the company had comparable sales growth of 3.5%, however the second quarter had 5.5% in comparable sales growth, which fell short of what analysts were looking for and unfortunately the company choked. El Pollo Loco has to put together a strong push for its comparable sales growth for this quarter if it wants a chance at making earnings.
During this quarter a few analysts weighed in on the company:
- Baird upgraded the stock to Outperform from Neutral with a $34 price target.
- William Blair reiterated an Outperform rating.
- Jefferies has a Buy rating.
So far in 2015, El Pollo Loco has not had a good run in the market. Shares are down about 10.6% year to date and down a whopping 47.6% in the past 52-weeks.
Shares of the crazy chicken were flat at $17.84 late Thursday morning. The stock has a consensus analyst price target of $27.67 and a 52-week trading range of $17.51 to $40.89.
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