Earnings Guidance
A company's forward-looking estimate of its expected future earnings or revenue, provided to investors and analysts.
What is Earnings Guidance?
Earnings guidance is a public statement from a company's management providing expectations for future financial performance — typically revenue, earnings per share (EPS), or operating income — for an upcoming quarter or fiscal year. Guidance gives investors and analysts a benchmark against which actual results will be measured; 'beating guidance' typically boosts a stock while 'missing guidance' often causes a sharp decline. Guidance can be quarterly, annual, or long-range. Not all companies provide guidance: some (including Berkshire Hathaway and Unilever) have deliberately stopped, arguing that short-term guidance encourages myopic decision-making and short-termism. Guidance is regulated — companies must be careful not to selectively disclose material information.
Example
Before reporting Q2 2023 earnings, Apple guided for revenue 'similar to the March quarter' of $94.8 billion. Actual reported revenue was $81.8 billion, which fell below many analysts' models. Companies sometimes give conservative guidance deliberately to make 'beating' it easier — a practice known as 'sandbagging.'