Rigel Pharmaceuticals, Inc. (NASDAQ:RIGL) just released its quarterly report and things are looking bullish. Results overall were solid, with revenues arriving 9.3% better than analyst forecasts at US$37m. Higher revenues also resulted in substantially lower statutory losses which, at US$0.06 per share, were 9.3% smaller than the analysts expected. The analysts typically update their forecasts at each earnings report, and we can judge from their estimates whether their view of the company has changed or if there are any new concerns to be aware of. We thought readers would find it interesting to see the analysts latest (statutory) post-earnings forecasts for next year.

See our latest analysis for Rigel Pharmaceuticals

Following the latest results, Rigel Pharmaceuticals' six analysts are now forecasting revenues of US$155.2m in 2024. This would be a notable 19% improvement in revenue compared to the last 12 months. The loss per share is expected to greatly reduce in the near future, narrowing 51% to US$0.39. Yet prior to the latest earnings, the analysts had been forecasting revenues of US$149.6m and losses of US$0.43 per share in 2024. So there seems to have been a moderate uplift in analyst sentiment with the latest consensus release, given the upgrades to both revenue and loss per share forecasts for this year.

The consensus price target rose 34% to US$26.75, with the analysts encouraged by the higher revenue and lower forecast losses for next year. It could also be instructive to look at the range of analyst estimates, to evaluate how different the outlier opinions are from the mean. There are some variant perceptions on Rigel Pharmaceuticals, with the most bullish analyst valuing it at US$57.00 and the most bearish at US$11.50 per share. So we wouldn't be assigning too much credibility to analyst price targets in this case, because there are clearly some widely different views on what kind of performance this business can generate. With this in mind, we wouldn't rely too heavily the consensus price target, as it is just an average and analysts clearly have some deeply divergent views on the business.

Looking at the bigger picture now, one of the ways we can make sense of these forecasts is to see how they measure up against both past performance and industry growth estimates. The analysts are definitely expecting Rigel Pharmaceuticals' growth to accelerate, with the forecast 42% annualised growth to the end of 2024 ranking favourably alongside historical growth of 7.3% per annum over the past five years. By contrast, our data suggests that other companies (with analyst coverage) in a similar industry are forecast to grow their revenue at 18% per year. It seems obvious that, while the growth outlook is brighter than the recent past, the analysts also expect Rigel Pharmaceuticals to grow faster than the wider industry.