Alcoa (AA) Looks To Kick Off Q410 Earnings Season On the Right Foot

Starting at the close of the market on Monday, the fourth quarter 2010 earnings parade kicks off...unofficially.

Alcoa (NYSE: AA) will be reporting their fourth quarter earnings report on Monday, January 10, 2010. The aluminum-producer is expected to report EPS of $0.19 on revs of $5.68 billion. Last quarter, the company reported EPS of $0.09 with revs of $5.3 billion, both edging out estimates.

Goldman Sachs believes that higher aluminum prices should buoy the company in Q410. They recently increased their six-month price target based on "higher sector multiples driven by improving investor confidence in an economic recovery in the U.S. and globally." They "expect a significant albeit forecast aluminum price tailwind (4Q10 15 day lagged aluminum price of $1.05/lb equaled our 4Q forecast of $1.05) in the 4Q to be partially offset by a weaker dollar."

With those factors in consideration, Goldman is looking for Q4 EPS of
$0.18 and FY10 EPS of $0.50.

Goldman has a Neutral rating on the shares, with a six-month price target of $14.00.

On January 2, Deutsche Bank upgraded the shares from Hold to Buy, increasing their price target from $14 to $22. They believe that Alcoa has turned the corner from an operational point of view.

Though not specifically commenting on the quarter, Deutsche said, "aluminum fundamentals could moderately improve on: 1) its laggard status versus copper; 2) higher thermal coal prices which could impact Chinese costs, raising global price deck; and 3) the launch of ETFs slated for 2011 that could draw-down inventories."

Deutsche is looking for EPS of $0.16.

The following is a brief list of notable releases happening over the next several weeks. Earnings releases are not expected to become exceptionally heavy until the week of January 24, however. Track all the earnings action this earnings season at EPS Insider:

January 14 - J.P. Morgan (NYSE: JPM)

January 18 - Citigroup (NYSE: C), Apple (NYSE: AAPL)

January 19 - Goldman Sachs (NYSE: GS), US Bancop (NYSE: USB), Wells Fargo (NYSE: WFC), Bank of NY (NYSE: BK), eBay (Nasdaq: EBAY)

January 20 - Morgan Stanley (NYSE: MS), Advanced Micro Devices (NYSE:
AMD), Starbucks (Nasdaq: SBUX), Google (Nasdaq: GOOG), Starbucks
(Nasdaq: SBUX)

January 21 - Ban of America (NYSE: BAC), General Electric (NYSE: GE)

January 24 - McDonald's (NYSE: MCD), American Express (NYSE: AXP)

January 25 - Hershey (NYSE: HSY), Verizon (NYSE: VZ), Yahoo! (YHOO)

January 26 - SAP AG (NYSE: SAP), Netflic (Nasdaq: NFLX)

January 27 - AT&T (NYSE: T), Caterpillar (NYSE: CAT), Ford (NYSE: F), Nokia (NYSE: NOK), Amazon.com (Nasdaq: AMZN)

February 1 - BP Plc (NYSE: BP), UPS (NYSE: UPS), Pfzer (NYSE: PFE), Broadcom (Nasdaq: BRCM)

February 2 - AOL (NYSE: AOL), NASDAQ (Nasdaq: NDAQ), Visa (NYSE: V), Yum! Brands (NYSE: YUM)

February 3 - CIGNA (NYSE: NYSE: CI), MasterCard (NYSE: MA), Viacom
(NYSE: VIA-B)

February 8 - Disney (NYSE: DIS)

February 9 - Coca-Cola (NYSE: KO)

February 10 - PepsiCo. (NYSE: PEP)

February 16 - Comcast (Nasdaq: CMCSA)

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