Hewlett-Packard Co. (NYSE: HPQ) is due to report earnings after the close of trading on Tuesday. Frankly, after the numbers we have seen from IBM, Cisco, and others, it is going to be hard to imagine how on earth to expect anything great. That being said, HP did offer guidance previously and if anything tied to an efficient market exists then it would seem very likely to expect that the bar has been set very low here.

We would also point out the Hewlett-Packard is less of a market impacting stock than it used to be. It was recently booted out of the Dow Jones Industrial Average. There is also no public stock of Dell to trading sympathy on this one any longer.

Thomson Reuters has estimates of $1.00 EPS and $27.9 billion in revenue for HP’s last quarter. This also marks the year-end report of 2013, so if those estimates are hit then the annual earnings would be $3.55 per share on $111.15 billion in revenue.

HP always gives guidance. The estimates for the coming quarter are $0.85 EPS and $26.8 billion in revenue. For the fiscal year ending in October of 2014, the consensus estimates are $3.66 in earnings per share and $107.6 billion in revenue.

Meg Whitman has warned that HP’s turnaround plan will be completed in 2016. What should stand out the most here is that sales for this fiscal year being reported this week will likely have been down almost 8% from the prior year and are expected to be down another 3% in 2014. Keep in mind that HP’s sales were down about 5.5% in 2012 from 2011.

Shares of HP are currently around $25.26 and the 52-week range is $12.22 to $27.78. The consensus analyst price target from Thomson Reuters is $24.97. Stay tuned.

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