As of today, the S&P 500 is expected to report a decline in earnings of -3.0% for the second quarter. What is the likelihood the index will report an actual decline in earnings of -3.0% for the quarter?
Based on the average change in earnings growth due to companies reporting positive earnings surprises during each earnings season, it is likely the index will report (year-over-year) growth in earnings for Q2.
When companies in the S&P 500 report actual earnings above estimates during an earnings season, the overall earnings growth rate for the index increases because the higher actual EPS numbers replace the lower estimated EPS numbers in the calculation of the growth rate. For example, if a company is projected to report EPS of $1.05 compared to year-ago EPS of $1.00, the company is projected to report earnings growth of 5%. If the company reports actual EPS of $1.10 (a $0.05 upside earnings surprise compared to the estimate), the actual earnings growth for the company for the quarter is now 10%, five percentage points above the estimated growth rate (10% - 5% = 5%).
Over the past five years on average, actual earnings reported by S&P 500 companies have exceeded estimated earnings by 4.8%. During this same period, 72% of companies in the S&P 500 have reported actual EPS above the mean EPS estimate on average. As a result, from the end of the quarter through the end of the earnings season, the earnings growth rate has typically increased by 3.7 percentage points on average (over the past 5 years) due to the number and magnitude of upside earnings surprises.
If this average increase is applied to the estimated earnings decline at the end of Q2 (June 30) of -2.7%, the actual earnings growth rate for the quarter would be 1.0% (-2.7% + 3.7% = 1.0%).
If the index does report earnings growth of 1.0% for Q2, it will mark the second lowest earnings growth reported by the index since Q2 2016, trailing only the previous quarter (-0.3%).