Smith & Wesson Stays Hot: Shares Soar 20% on EPS Beat, New View

Red-hot shares of Smith & Wesson (NASDAQ:SWHC) surged 20% on Friday after the gun maker’s quarterly results and more bullish guidance blew Wall Street’s expectations out of the water.

The stronger-than-expected results and rosier outlook prompted a number of analysts to upgrade their price targets on the historic gun manufacturer.

Smith & Wesson impressed Wall Street late Thursday by hiking its full-year forecast, now forecasting EPS of 85 cents to 90 cents on sales of $530 million to $540 million. The new guidance was well above estimates from analysts for EPS of just 63 cents on sales of $498.2 million.

For the current quarter, management expects to post EPS of 19 cents to 21 cents and generate sales of $130 million to $135 million. Even the low end of that range would top the Street’s expectations for EPS of 13 cents on revenue of $119 million.

Encouraged by the new guidance, analysts at Northland Capital raised Smith & Wesson’s price target to $17 from $14 and maintained an “outperform” rating. Likewise, Wedbush boosted its target to $11 from $10 and kept a bullish rating.

Also, Smith & Wesson reported a fiscal first quarter profit of $17.8 million, or 27 cents a share, compared with $791,000, or one cent a share, a year earlier. On an adjusted basis, it earned 28 cents a share, significantly surpassing the Street’s view of 18 cents.

Sales soared 48% to $136 million, solidly topping forecasts from analysts for $128.7 million.

“Internal capacity increases, enhanced supply chain integration capabilities, and strong execution by our operations team allowed us to exceed our revenue and earnings guidance by capturing incremental sales,” CEO James Debney said in a statement.

Shares of Springfield, Mass.-based Smith & Wesson climbed 19.49% to $10.74 Friday morning, giving them an eye-popping 2012 surge of 148%.