Stuart Olson Inc CUUHF

Issue: Is Revenue Trend Up or Down?

[RetailRube]

The company beat the revenue estimate by analysts for 4 consecutive quarters, until they missed in the 2Q/2018 quarter results.  This is again from the Globe/Reuters websites.

In 2Q/2018, analysts expected $274m of revenue and the company reported $249m.

This begs the question:  Is the restructuring working?  Or is SOX starting to shrink again after blowing up Churchill Corp?  Here is the revenue trend:

2016-1Q:  246 million
2016-2Q:  227
2016-3Q:  222
2016-4Q:  219
2017-1Q:  220
2017-2Q:  246
2017-3Q:  268
2017-4Q:  283
2018-1Q:  266
2018-2Q:  249

You can see how we were on a nice uptrend in 2017, but it reversed in 2018.  The company's explains each quarter-to-quarter change, but never the overall trend.  Looking at the divisional trends shows that when one division goes up, another goes down.  There is no pattern that would enable me to say any one division is in trouble.

Mr Atkinson from the building divsion left the business after 2Q/2018.  Perhaps this says they want to do better in the building division.  Or it could say that Mr. Atkinson got a better job with a competitor.  I tried checking Linked-In to see what Mr. Atkinson is doing now, but Linked-In is now behind a paywall.  If anyone is a member of Linked-In, could they help us out  by researching this?

Conclusion is revenue trend cannot be forecasted.  But markets hate uncertainty.  This uncertain trend likely contributes to the stock price decline.