It's been a good week for Columbia Sportswear Company (NASDAQ:COLM) shareholders, because the company has just released its latest third-quarter results, and the shares gained 6.9% to US$80.35. Revenues were US$932m, approximately in line with expectations, although statutory earnings per share (EPS) performed substantially better. EPS of US$1.56 were also better than expected, beating analyst predictions by 15%. 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. Readers will be glad to know we've aggregated the latest statutory forecasts to see whether the analysts have changed their mind on Columbia Sportswear after the latest results.

Check out our latest analysis for Columbia Sportswear

Taking into account the latest results, the consensus forecast from Columbia Sportswear's nine analysts is for revenues of US$3.49b in 2025. This reflects a modest 4.7% improvement in revenue compared to the last 12 months. Per-share earnings are expected to grow 17% to US$4.29. In the lead-up to this report, the analysts had been modelling revenues of US$3.52b and earnings per share (EPS) of US$4.37 in 2025. So it looks like there's been a small decline in overall sentiment after the recent results - there's been no major change to revenue estimates, but the analysts did make a minor downgrade to their earnings per share forecasts.

It might be a surprise to learn that the consensus price target was broadly unchanged at US$80.75, with the analysts clearly implying that the forecast decline in earnings is not expected to have much of an impact on valuation. Fixating on a single price target can be unwise though, since the consensus target is effectively the average of analyst price targets. As a result, some investors like to look at the range of estimates to see if there are any diverging opinions on the company's valuation. The most optimistic Columbia Sportswear analyst has a price target of US$99.00 per share, while the most pessimistic values it at US$60.00. As you can see, analysts are not all in agreement on the stock's future, but the range of estimates is still reasonably narrow, which could suggest that the outcome is not totally unpredictable.

Of course, another way to look at these forecasts is to place them into context against the industry itself. We would highlight that Columbia Sportswear's revenue growth is expected to slow, with the forecast 3.7% annualised growth rate until the end of 2025 being well below the historical 5.6% p.a. growth over the last five years. Compare this against other companies (with analyst forecasts) in the industry, which are in aggregate expected to see revenue growth of 5.9% annually. So it's pretty clear that, while revenue growth is expected to slow down, the wider industry is also expected to grow faster than Columbia Sportswear.

The Bottom Line

The biggest concern is that the analysts reduced their earnings per share estimates, suggesting business headwinds could lay ahead for Columbia Sportswear. On the plus side, there were no major changes to revenue estimates; although forecasts imply they will perform worse than the wider industry. There was no real change to the consensus price target, suggesting that the intrinsic value of the business has not undergone any major changes with the latest estimates.

With that said, the long-term trajectory of the company's earnings is a lot more important than next year. We have estimates - from multiple Columbia Sportswear analysts - going out to 2026, and you can see them free on our platform here.

Even so, be aware that Columbia Sportswear is showing 1 warning sign in our investment analysis , you should know about...

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