LendingTree, Inc. (NASDAQ:TREE) shareholders will have a reason to smile today, with the analysts making substantial upgrades to this year's statutory forecasts. The analysts have sharply increased their revenue numbers, with a view that LendingTree will make substantially more sales than they'd previously expected.

Following the upgrade, the latest consensus from LendingTree's eight analysts is for revenues of US$853m in 2024, which would reflect a huge 28% improvement in sales compared to the last 12 months. The losses are expected to disappear over the next year or so, with forecasts for a profit of US$0.59 per share this year. Prior to this update, the analysts had been forecasting revenues of US$717m and earnings per share (EPS) of US$0.57 in 2024. The most recent forecasts are noticeably more optimistic, with a substantial gain in revenue estimates and a lift to earnings per share as well.

Check out our latest analysis for LendingTree

It will come as no surprise to learn that the analysts have increased their price target for LendingTree 18% to US$62.88 on the back of these upgrades.

These estimates are interesting, but it can be useful to paint some more broad strokes when seeing how forecasts compare, both to the LendingTree's past performance and to peers in the same industry. For example, we noticed that LendingTree's rate of growth is expected to accelerate meaningfully, with revenues forecast to exhibit 63% growth to the end of 2024 on an annualised basis. That is well above its historical decline of 7.2% a year over the past five years. Compare this against analyst estimates for the broader industry, which suggest that (in aggregate) industry revenues are expected to grow 12% annually. So it looks like LendingTree is expected to grow faster than its competitors, at least for a while.

The Bottom Line

The most important thing to take away from this upgrade is that analysts upgraded their earnings per share estimates for this year, expecting improving business conditions. Fortunately, analysts also upgraded their revenue estimates, and our data indicates sales are expected to perform better than the wider market. There was also a nice increase in the price target, with analysts apparently feeling that the intrinsic value of the business is improving. Seeing the dramatic upgrade to this year's forecasts, it might be time to take another look at LendingTree.

Still, the long-term prospects of the business are much more relevant than next year's earnings. We have estimates - from multiple LendingTree analysts - going out to 2026, and you can see them free on our platform here.

Another way to search for interesting companies that could be reaching an inflection point is to track whether management are buying or selling, with our free list of growing companies backed by insiders.

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