EARNINGS PRINTS

Methodology

Updated

This page defines every term used on the data pages. If a page departs from a rule below, it says so on the page itself.

Sources

  • Quarterly and annual reports. Revenue, net income and diluted earnings per share come from the structured (XBRL) data in each company's Form 10-Q and Form 10-K on SEC EDGAR. Where a period appears in several filings, the value from the most recently filed one is used, because it reflects later restatements and share splits.
  • Earnings press releases. Before the 10-Q or 10-K exists, a page can use the GAAP income statement in the press release (Exhibit 99.1 of a Form 8-K). Those figures are labelled preliminary and replaced or confirmed when the full report is filed.
  • What counts as an earnings release. A Form 8-K under Item 2.02 that is filed shortly after a quarter ends and contains an income statement. Other releases under the same item, such as vehicle delivery counts, are not treated as earnings.

All figures are US GAAP as filed. Adjusted and non-GAAP measures are never used.

Verification statuses

Every number carries a status that decides whether it can be shown.

  • verified: matches at least one independent source, for example the XBRL data of the 10-Q, or the press-release table read by software and entered separately by a person without seeing the software's result.
  • single source: only one party has produced the value. It is not published until a second source agrees.
  • pending: not entered yet.
  • n/a: no value exists and none can be derived honestly. It is displayed as "n/a".

A page is published only when every number it shows is verified or explicitly n/a. Fourth-quarter diluted EPS is an example of n/a (see below).

Quarters and labels

A quarter is identified by its start and end dates, not by the fiscal tags inside a filing. Labels follow the company's own naming: a company whose fiscal year differs from the calendar year is shown as "Q2 FY27", a company whose fiscal year is the calendar year as "Q3 2026". Some retailers name the fiscal year after the calendar year in which it starts; this site uses the company's convention.

Fourth quarters

Companies file no separate Form 10-Q for the fourth quarter. For revenue and net income the fourth quarter is the fiscal-year total minus the first nine months, and the value is marked as derived. Diluted EPS is not derived this way, because share counts differ from period to period and EPS cannot be subtracted. Fourth-quarter EPS is shown only when the company prints it in its press release and it has been verified; otherwise it is n/a, and no EPS statement is made about that quarter.

Year-over-year change

Year-over-year (YoY) change compares a quarter with the same fiscal quarter of the previous year:

YoY % = (current value / value a year earlier - 1) x 100

Percentages are rounded half-up to one decimal. A YoY change is calculated only when:

  1. both quarters are 13 weeks long (91 days, give or take two), and
  2. neither is marked as recast, and
  3. the value a year earlier is greater than zero.

When the value a year earlier is zero or negative, no percentage is shown. The page says instead that the company returned to a profit, moved to a loss, or that a loss narrowed or widened. Quarter-over-quarter (sequential) change uses the same formula against the immediately preceding quarter.

14-week quarters

Companies with 52/53-week fiscal years occasionally have a 14-week quarter. An extra week of sales is not growth, so YoY percentages that involve a 14-week quarter are not calculated and no growth headline is based on them. Sequential change and margin are still shown, and the chart marks the quarter.

Recast and restated periods

A company may restate earlier periods after a spin-off, divestiture or accounting change. Periods that sit on the old basis are shown in the tables with a mark but are left out of charts, records, streaks and growth rates, so that a number is never compared with one on a different basis. The year-earlier value on a quarter page is the one printed in the comparison column of the same report, labelled "as recast by the company" if it differs from what was first reported. We check it against the XBRL data; revenue and net income must agree within 0.5 percent and EPS to the cent, otherwise the page is held for manual review.

Share splits

Per-share figures are compared only on a consistent, split-adjusted basis. If a split falls between two periods and a comparable value is not available, no EPS change and no EPS record is stated.

Net margin

Net margin is net income attributable to the company divided by total revenue for the same quarter, as a percentage. It describes how much of each revenue dollar remained as net income under GAAP; it says nothing about the quality of earnings.

Trailing four quarters

The trailing-four-quarter (TTM) figure is the sum of the latest four consecutive quarters. It is shown only when all four exist on the same basis, with no recast period among them.

"Highest" and "record"

A quarter is called a record only against the continuous, like-for-like run of quarters available on the page, and the page names that run, for example "since Q3 FY17". At least twelve quarters are needed; with a shorter history the page says "highest of the N comparable quarters" and does not use the word record. "Best growth in N quarters" never claims more quarters than the chart shows.

Release history

History pages list the acceptance timestamps (US Eastern Time) of past earnings releases, taken from Form 8-K filings. They are a record of what happened. The site does not publish upcoming, expected or estimated dates.

Timestamps and updates

"Data as of" shows when the newest filing used on the page was accepted by the SEC, in US Eastern Time. When the 10-Q or 10-K replaces preliminary figures, or a company revises a number, the page is updated and the change is noted on the page. Our own mistakes are listed on the corrections page.

Review before advertising

The editor's notes and the other texts on this site are prepared by the editorial team with the help of automation, including AI tools. The numbers are not written by hand or by a model: they are read from SEC filings by software and matched automatically against the data on SEC EDGAR, and a page whose figures do not match is not published. Each note is written for one specific quarter or company page and may only use numbers that appear on that page or in the cited filing.

Every page is then read in full and approved by the editor, who publishes under the pen name Alex Brix (see About), before advertising is switched on. A note carries the line "Reviewed by the Earnings Prints editor", which links here. If the content of a page changes afterwards, the review is repeated and advertising is switched off until then. Our own mistakes are listed on the corrections page.

Rounding and formats

Tables show dollars in millions as filed ("$46,743M"); headlines use the short form ("$46.7B"). Percentages have one decimal; margin changes are in percentage points (pp).

Questions about a definition: [email protected].