For a good part of 2012 and 2013, fears in the U.S. that tighter firearm laws were on the horizon helped drive sales for gun manufacturers and retailers alike. As those fears began to dissipate in 2014, sales of guns and ammunition suffered. In 2015, however, fresh political rhetoric regarding stricter gun laws, prompted by a string of mass shootings throughout the year, boosted the sector once again. During the year the FBI processed a record number of firearm applications, a trend that is continuing into 2016.

Guns are a big business in the US. According to the National Shooting Sports Foundation’s Firearms and Ammunition Industry Economic Impact Report 2014, the industry has an economic impact to the tune of $43 billion. Civilian gun sales have surged since the financial crisis and since Obama took office, and every time the president mentions tougher gun laws those stocks go up. In fact, Black Friday 2015 was the single biggest gun purchasing day ever. This of course is great for gun manufacturers such as Smith & Wesson (SWHC) which reports its fiscal Q3 2016 earnings after Thursday’s closing bell, on the heels of stellar results from competitor Sturm, Ruger & Co (RGR).

After posting negative earnings and revenue growth for every quarter of 2014, Smith & Wesson returned to year-over-year growth in 2015, even putting up triple-digit EPS growth in the latest quarter. For the current quarter, the Estimize community is anticipating EPS of $0.41, in-line with the Wall Street consensus. However, our Select Consensus which more heavily weights historically accurate analysts and recent estimates, is predicting a two cent beat. Revenues of $183.5 million are currently $1.2M ahead of the Street.

These figures predict profit growth of 115% year-over-year, and sales growth of 40%. Earnings estimates have been trending upwards into the report, climbing 61% in the last three months, and this is a company that regularly beats. Historically, Smith & Wesson has surpassed the Wall Street consensus 96% of the time on the bottom-line and 92% on the top-line.