Cameco Earnings: A $0.08 to $0.38 Spread on One Quarter
Cameco earnings for the third quarter arrive before markets open on Friday, October 30, 2026, and the 13 analysts with a published estimate for the quarter do not agree on what they will show. Their estimates for Cameco (TSX: CCO) run from $0.08 a share at the low end to $0.38 at the high end, on one quarter. The consensus mean sits at $0.27, data as of October 29, 2026, on Yahoo Finance’s series. Figures here are in Canadian dollars unless marked otherwise, which is how Cameco reports, and the share price is the Toronto listing rather than CCJ in New York.
Revenue consensus is $753.9 million from 7 analysts, in a range of $628.6 million to $833.0 million, against Yahoo’s year-ago Q3 revenue comparative of $614.6 million, which implies growth of 22.7%. Yahoo’s year-ago Q3 EPS comparative is $0.07, so the EPS consensus implies a near-quadrupling off a depressed base rather than a step up from a normal one. We read the Yahoo series as an adjusted basis: the $0.18 it recorded for Q2 reconciles to Cameco’s adjusted net earnings of $77 million, not to the $25 million the company reported under IFRS.
Where the consensus moved, and when
| Yahoo Finance consensus EPS | 90 days ago | 60 days ago | 30 days ago | 7 days ago | Now |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Q3 2026 | $0.352 | $0.328 | $0.332 | $0.333 | $0.273 |
| Q4 2026 | $0.530 | $0.505 | $0.511 | $0.559 | $0.564 |
| FY2026 | $1.674 | $1.481 | $1.471 | $1.452 | $1.447 |
| FY2027 | $2.687 | $2.607 | $2.602 | $2.600 | $2.657 |
Six cents came off the quarterly mean in the past week. Over thirty days the quarter is down 5.89 cents and Q4 is up 5.31 cents, which is close enough to look like money moved out of one quarter and into the next.
Read week by week, it did not happen that way. Between thirty and seven days ago, Q4 rose about 4.9 cents while Q3 sat still, $0.332 to $0.333. Then in the last seven days Q3 fell about six cents while Q4 barely moved, up 0.43 cents. The two moves landed in different weeks. The full year fell 2.43 cents over the same thirty days, so part of the reduction did not go anywhere.
Whether the past month is a forward shift, a change in the set of estimates being averaged, or a genuine cut cannot be determined from the published means alone. If the panel being averaged is unstable, the $0.08 low end may be an estimate nobody has refreshed rather than a live bearish call. The range is still a fact about what is published, and so we treat the weekly move as a fact about the published mean, not as a read on analyst sentiment.
Over 90 days three of the four series fell and one rose. The quarter is down 22.6% and the full year is down 13.6%, on our arithmetic on the table above, while Q4 went the other way, up 6.3%. The year now sits at $1.45 from 18 analysts against FY2025’s $1.44. Flat on the year. The 2027 number fell 1.1% over the same 90 days, which is barely a move, and now stands at $2.66 from 17 analysts in a range of $2.05 to $4.10. What has come off has come off this year, not the multi-year thesis.
One checkable fact belongs beside that, and it is not a forecast. Reporting Q3 2025 on November 5, 2025, consensus was also $0.27, and Cameco delivered $0.07. The Street is asking for the same figure again.
The hardest line to model is not uranium
Cameco holds an equity-accounted investment in Westinghouse, which the company calls “our investment in Westinghouse”, and its share of Westinghouse’s result is reported inside Cameco’s own earnings. That line swings on project milestones at reactor builds rather than on uranium, and it is large enough to set the direction of a quarter by itself.
The scale of it is in Cameco’s Q2 2026 results release. Cameco’s share of Westinghouse was a net loss of $10 million in Q2 2026, against earnings of $126 million (Cameco’s share) in Q2 2025, and a net loss of $56 million across the first six months of 2026 against net earnings of $64 million in the same period a year earlier. On adjusted EBITDA, which Cameco states is a non-IFRS measure, its share of Westinghouse was $163 million in Q2 2026 versus $352 million in Q2 2025, and $284 million versus $445 million for the half.
Cameco gave its own reason, verbatim: equity earnings were lower than in 2025 “due to Westinghouse’s participation in the construction project for two nuclear reactors at the Dukovany power plant in the Czech Republic, which resulted in an approximate US$170 million increase in our share of Westinghouse’s 2025 second quarter revenue.”
The uranium business, meanwhile, did not collapse. Segment earnings before taxes were $170 million in Q2 2026 with adjusted EBITDA of $252 million, against $281 million and $352 million in Q2 2025, a decline Cameco attributed to “normal quarterly variations in deliveries and our lower planned 2026 sales delivery volumes resulting from our contracting discipline” rather than to weak pricing. Over six months the segment is ahead of last year: $528 million of earnings before taxes and $676 million of adjusted EBITDA, against $509 million and $641 million in 2025.
Consolidated Q2 2026 reported net earnings under IFRS were $25 million, with adjusted net earnings of $77 million and adjusted EBITDA of $391 million. For the first half, reported net earnings were $156 million, adjusted net earnings $281 million and adjusted EBITDA $899 million. Cameco’s own summary of the half: results “were lower than in 2025, primarily due to lower equity earnings from our investment in Westinghouse.”
The distance between $25 million reported and $77 million adjusted is where much of the modelling difficulty lives, and the reconciliation between them sits in the company’s filing rather than in any summary of it. Our guide on how to read an annual report covers where a non-IFRS reconciliation is disclosed, for anyone who wants to follow the line through the document themselves.
Cameco also handed readers a new set of disclosures to check this quarter against. In the Q2 release it states it has “updated and expanded” its Westinghouse disclosure across six items: target future capital expenditures, both sustaining and expansion; backlog and new orders entered in the Operating Plants and New Plants business segments; the capital allocation framework; the pipeline of opportunities being pursued for the AP1000; illustrative economics and assumptions for AP1000 deployments; and illustrative economics and assumptions for AP300 and eVinci deployments. The franchise those disclosures describe is a large one. Westinghouse technology is used by 57% of the global operating fleet of 417 reactors, which Cameco says it believes “makes it one of the most strategically important franchises in the global nuclear power industry”, and it puts the AP1000 pipeline at up to 91 reactor opportunities. For a holder trying to model the line that moved Q2, those six items are the pages to open on Friday.
We doubt a $0.08 to $0.38 range on one quarter is thirteen people disagreeing about the price of uranium.
What the mine produced, and what the pounds cost
Cameco produced 3.9 million pounds of U3O8 on its own share in Q2 2026. Packaged production at McArthur River and Key Lake was 3.3 million pounds (2.3 million pounds Cameco’s share) and at Cigar Lake 2.9 million pounds (1.6 million pounds Cameco’s share), which together make up that 3.9 million. JV Inkai produced 2.8 million pounds on a 100% basis in the quarter, pounds that reach Cameco as a purchase allocation rather than as segment production. Inkai also paid: Cameco received US$124 million from the joint venture in the quarter, net of withholdings, a dividend based on 2025 financial performance that the company notes had been previously disclosed. Full-year uranium segment guidance is 19.5 to 21.5 million pounds on Cameco’s share.
None of the cost side appears in the Yahoo consensus table. Cameco delivered 7.1 million pounds of U3O8 in the quarter against the 3.9 million it produced on its share, bought 2.8 million pounds of uranium at an average unit cost of $91.40 per pound (US$66.60 per pound), and closed June 30, 2026 holding 8.7 million pounds of inventory at an average inventory cost of $58.05 per pound. Purchased pounds cost roughly 57% more than the closing average inventory cost at June 30, on our arithmetic. Pointing the other way, Cameco says its average realized prices “continue to improve in both the uranium and fuel services segments as prices from market-related contracts have increased.” We take that as a counterweight on the uranium side, because the same release records fuel services results in 2026 as “mainly driven by a lower average realized price”.
Cameco has also closed its agreement to increase its ownership interest in the Cigar Lake mine. CEO Tim Gitzel’s framing of it: the closing “reinforces our commitment to own and operate scarce, world-class, proven tier-one assets that we expect to be essential in supporting future reactor growth.”
What this report either confirms or breaks
Each of these is Cameco’s own stated position from its last release, which is what makes it testable on Friday.
Uranium production guidance. Cameco expects to produce “between 19.5 to 21.5 million pounds of U3O8 (our share) in 2026” in the uranium segment, and it held that range through unplanned disruptions at Key Lake and McArthur River during Q2 and at Cigar Lake after the quarter closed, which “have not changed our production guidance.” It also cited flooding-related disruptions to its northern Saskatchewan supply routes. The Cigar Lake event falls inside the Q3 period, so whether the range still stands is the first operational question of this report. It is also one of the figures behind where Cameco sits among Canadian mining and uranium stocks.
Inkai deliveries, which are back-end loaded. JV Inkai “remains on track to produce 10.4 million pounds of U3O8 (100% basis) in 2026”, of which Cameco’s purchase allocation is expected to be 4.2 million pounds. Only 0.8 million pounds were delivered in the first half. “The majority of our share of 2026 production is expected to be received before the end of 2026.”
Fuel services. Cameco continues to expect annual production, which includes UF6 conversion, UO2 conversion and heavy water reactor fuel bundles, “to be between 13 million and 14 million kgU.” The segment produced 3.0 million kgU in the second quarter, which is the number to set the next quarter’s figure against in deciding whether the annual range is on pace.
An outlook that was already updated once. In the Q2 release Cameco updated its outlook for average realized price, revenue and cost of sales in uranium, for revenue and cost of sales in fuel services, and for consolidated revenue, “reflecting an increase in the UxC spot price and our updated exchange rate assumption based on the continued strength in the US dollar.” Q3 tests whether that updated outlook holds.
The contract book. In uranium, “over the next five years, we have contracts in place for average annual deliveries of over 28 million pounds of U3O8 per year”, with commitments higher than that average in 2026 through 2028 and lower than it in 2029 and 2030.
Westinghouse. The equity line is a loss through the first six months. On our reading, whether Q3 turns it is the single biggest swing factor in the reported number.
Four beats, four misses, and tails that swamp the average
Across the last eight reports, n=8, Cameco has four beats and four misses against Yahoo Finance consensus. The average surprise of -18.3% says little on its own, because it is dragged by two very large misses: -104.1% on November 7, 2024 ($0.25 expected, a loss of $0.01 delivered) and -74.5% on November 5, 2025 ($0.27 expected, $0.07 delivered). A third, -52.1%, came on July 31, 2026 ($0.38 expected, $0.18 delivered). The beats reach nowhere near as far: +38.1% on May 5, 2026, +37.6% on July 31, 2025, and +12.9% twice. The distribution is asymmetric, with the misses running much further from consensus than the beats, and that asymmetry rather than the mean is the story.
Cameco EPS surprise versus Yahoo Finance consensus, last eight reports. Consensus and prices: Yahoo Finance.
What the stock did after each of the last eight reports
These are eight observations and nothing more.
| Report date | Result | Next session | 30 days | 90 days |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| 2024-11-07 | miss -104.1% | +3.82% | +14.31% | +0.97% |
| 2025-02-20 | beat +12.9% | -0.41% | -1.03% | +9.29% |
| 2025-05-01 | miss -17.5% | +1.24% | +28.17% | +72.83% |
| 2025-07-31 | beat +37.6% | -3.27% | -3.35% | +38.35% |
| 2025-11-05 | miss -74.5% | -1.62% | -7.46% | +26.09% |
| 2026-02-13 | beat +12.9% | -2.83% | -4.76% | -2.61% |
| 2026-05-05 | beat +38.1% | -3.09% | -1.72% | -18.76% |
| 2026-07-31 | miss -52.1% | -2.09% | +10.73% | -5.61% |
In this window of eight, the immediate reaction ran against the result. The stock fell in the next session after all four of its last four beats (-0.41%, -3.27%, -2.83%, -3.09%), an average of -2.4%, while after a miss the average next-session move was +0.34% and the stock rose in two of those four cases. Across all eight the average next-session move was -1.03%, and the stock was higher in only 2 of 8. Thirty days out the average was +4.36%, higher in 3 of 8. Ninety days out it was +15.07%, higher in 5 of 8, and the largest single contributor to that figure is the +72.8% that followed a miss in May 2025.
Where the stock sits, and the longer-run shape
Cameco closed Thursday, October 29, 2026 at $116.63 against a prior close of $117.25, on Yahoo Finance data. That is 36.2% below the 52-week high of $182.72 and 8.4% above the 52-week low of $107.55, on our arithmetic. Published analyst price targets have a mean of $179 and a median of $182, with a low of $134 and a high of $195, which puts even the lowest of them about 15% above the current price, on our arithmetic. That is what the Street currently publishes, not an endorsement of it.
Cameco revenue by fiscal year, in millions of Canadian dollars. Source: Cameco Corporation annual filings with the SEC (40-F), fiscal 2021 through fiscal 2025, XBRL structured financial data as filed.
The filing data shows the same shape as the quarterly record. Revenue went from $1,475 million in FY2021 to $3,482 million in FY2025, compounding at 24.0% a year on our arithmetic on the filed figures, and operating cash flow went from $458 million to $1,408 million, dipping only once, in FY2022. Net income is the line that will not behave: a loss of $103 million in FY2021, then $89 million, $361 million, a drop to $172 million in FY2024, then $590 million in FY2025. Steady top line, steady cash, lumpy earnings. As of June 30, 2026 the balance sheet behind that held $1.1 billion in cash and cash equivalents against $1.0 billion of total debt, with a $1.0 billion undrawn revolving credit facility.
When and how it reports
Per Cameco’s own scheduling advisory, dated Saskatoon, October 21, 2026, the company “will issue its third quarter results before markets open on Friday, October 30th, 2026”, with the conference call “on Friday, October 30th, at 8:00 a.m. Eastern”. Cameco says it “will discuss trends in the market and the execution of its strategy before opening the call to questions from investors and the media.”
What it means for holders
There is a reasonable case that the quarter matters less than the move in consensus makes it look. The uranium segment is ahead of last year through six months on Cameco’s own numbers, the contract book commits to average annual deliveries above 28 million pounds for five years, and the line that moved the reported figure in Q2 was an equity result measured against a prior-year quarter inflated by one project milestone.
There is an equally reasonable case that it matters more. The published consensus for this year is down 13.6% in 90 days, the stock is 36% below its 52-week high, a Cigar Lake disruption landed inside the quarter being reported, and the Inkai pounds that were always meant to be back-end loaded now have to actually arrive. The Street’s own fourth quarter sits awkwardly beside the flat-year reading too: Yahoo’s Q4 revenue consensus of $1,085.3 million from 5 analysts is 9.6% below its year-ago comparative of about $1.2 billion in the same series. The full-year line in that series is what makes the two fit: a 2026 revenue consensus of $3,484.4 million from 12 analysts against a year-ago $3,482.0 million, essentially flat, with 2027 at $4,020.0 million, 15.4% above the 2026 figure. A flat full year alongside a below-year-ago fourth quarter is arithmetically ordinary if the first three quarters ran above last year’s.
Where both cases agree is on which paragraph to read first. A holder learns more from the guidance paragraph than from the EPS line, because the EPS line carries Westinghouse and the guidance paragraph carries the mine.
Disclaimer: The content on bestcanadianstocks.ca is for informational and entertainment purposes only and does not constitute financial advice. Past performance is not indicative of future results. Always consult a qualified financial advisor before making investment decisions. Consensus EPS and revenue, the consensus trend series, the eight-report surprise and price-reaction history, analyst price targets and the latest price are from Yahoo Finance, credited in plain text and labelled in the piece. Company figures (production in pounds, purchase and inventory cost per pound, the Westinghouse equity line, segment results, guidance ranges, the contract book and the balance sheet) are from Cameco’s own Q2 2026 results release. The report date, the before-the-open phrasing and the 8:00 a.m. Eastern call time are from Cameco’s own scheduling advisory of October 21, 2026. The five-fiscal-year series is from Cameco’s Form 40-F SEC filings via XBRL. Percentages and ratios not published by the source are labelled as our arithmetic.
