Estimize CEO Sees Q1 Beat For LinkedIn

LinkedIn Corp (NYSE: LNKD) will beat the Wall Street profit consensus by 7 percent according to a crowd-sourced earnings projection service.

"We believe LinkedIn is going to perform really well," said Leigh Drogen, chief executive of Estimize.

Drogen was speaking April 14 at a conference, sponsored by SunTrust, concerning Internet companies' first quarter earnings.

The Mountain View, California-based social media employment company is set to post quarterly results later Thursday.

LinkedIn is expected to report first quarter profit of $0.56 a share, on revenue of $636.48 million, according to the average estimate of 36 Wall Street analysts polled by Thomson Financial Network.

But Drogen's Estimize service currently projects earnings for LinkedIn of $0.60 a share, on revenue of $648.65 million, according to the average of 120 anonymous estimates.

Related Link: LinkedIn Earnings Preview: The Street And The Crowd Expect To See At Least 50% EPS Growth

That suggests a 7 percent earnings beat on revenue 1.7 percent higher than expected.

In the same mid-April call, Drogen said he expected "a really huge revenue number" from Twitter Inc (NASDAQ: TWTR).

But Twitter's $436 million in first quarter revenue missed the Estimize projection by more than 6 percent and the Wall Street consensus by more than 4 percent.

On the other hand, Estimize nailed Twitter's $0.07 in first quarter earnings per share, which beat the Wall Street estimate by 75 percent.