Blue Foundry Bancorp (NASDAQ:BLFY) just released its quarterly report and things are looking bullish. Results overall were solid, with revenues arriving 7.1% better than analyst forecasts at US$10m. Higher revenues also resulted in substantially lower statutory losses which, at US$0.11 per share, were 7.1% smaller than the analysts expected. Following the result, the analysts have updated their earnings model, and it would be good to know whether they think there's been a strong change in the company's prospects, or if it's business as usual. We thought readers would find it interesting to see the analysts latest (statutory) post-earnings forecasts for next year.

View our latest analysis for Blue Foundry Bancorp

Taking into account the latest results, the current consensus, from the two analysts covering Blue Foundry Bancorp, is for revenues of US$40.3m in 2024. This implies a noticeable 3.7% reduction in Blue Foundry Bancorp's revenue over the past 12 months. Losses are forecast to balloon 36% to US$0.60 per share. Before this earnings announcement, the analysts had been modelling revenues of US$39.1m and losses of US$0.74 per share in 2024. So it seems there's been a definite increase in optimism about Blue Foundry Bancorp's future following the latest consensus numbers, with a cut to the loss per share forecasts in particular.

The consensus price target rose 7.1% to US$9.38, with the analysts encouraged by the higher revenue and lower forecast losses for next year.

These estimates are interesting, but it can be useful to paint some more broad strokes when seeing how forecasts compare, both to the Blue Foundry Bancorp's past performance and to peers in the same industry. One more thing stood out to us about these estimates, and it's the idea that Blue Foundry Bancorp's decline is expected to accelerate, with revenues forecast to fall at an annualised rate of 7.3% to the end of 2024. This tops off a historical decline of 1.8% a year over the past three years. Compare this against analyst estimates for companies in the broader industry, which suggest that revenues (in aggregate) are expected to grow 6.3% annually. So it's pretty clear that, while it does have declining revenues, the analysts also expect Blue Foundry Bancorp to suffer worse than the wider industry.

The Bottom Line

The most obvious conclusion is that the analysts made no changes to their forecasts for a loss next year. They also upgraded their revenue estimates for next year, even though it is expected to grow slower than the wider industry. There was also a nice increase in the price target, with the analysts clearly feeling that the intrinsic value of the business is improving.