NEW YORK (TheStreet) -- Earlier today the CFO of CSX Corp. Fredrik Eliasson issued a release discussing the company's financial performance, updated its first quarter market outlook and discussed earnings expectations for 2015. These topics would also be discussed today at the JPMorgan Aviation, Transportation & Industrials conference held in New York City. In this morning's statement the transportation supplier said it is expecting at least a 5% decline in its domestic coal shipments this year, but is anticipating that it will meet its growth targets as it continues to expand in its merchandise and intermodal markets. "We continue to expect strong earnings growth in the first quarter as merchandise and intermodal customers see growth opportunities and recognize the value and efficiency of freight rail service. By leveraging price and efficiency gains combined with expected volume increases, we continue to target double-digit earnings growth for the full-year 2015," Eliasson's statement said. Exclusive Report: Jim Cramer's Best Stocks for 2015 Eliasson added that achieving that goal will prove more difficult due to the expected drop in the company's coal movements. The decline is reflecting what CSX calls a "relatively mild winter" and lower natural gas prices. With oil prices remaining down the company is expecting growth in crude shipments to be more moderate than it originally anticipated. Shares of CSX are up by 0.15% to $34.17 in mid-afternoon trading on Wednesday. Separately, TheStreet Ratings team rates CSX CORP as a Buy with a ratings score of A-. TheStreet Ratings Team has this to say about their recommendation: "We rate CSX CORP (CSX) a BUY. This is based on the convergence of positive investment measures, which should help this stock outperform the majority of stocks that we rate. The company's strengths can be seen in multiple areas, such as its solid stock price performance, growth in earnings per share, revenue growth, reasonable valuation levels and good cash flow from operations. We feel these strengths outweigh the fact that the company has had somewhat disappointing return on equity." Highlights from the analysis by TheStreet Ratings Team goes as follows: Investors have apparently begun to recognize positive factors similar to those we have mentioned in this report, including earnings growth. This has helped drive up the company's shares by a sharp 26.09% over the past year, a rise that has exceeded that of the S&P 500 Index. Regarding the stock's future course, although almost any stock can fall in a broad market decline, CSX should continue to move higher despite the fact that it has already enjoyed a very nice gain in the past year. CSX CORP has improved earnings per share by 16.7% in the most recent quarter compared to the same quarter a year ago. The company has demonstrated a pattern of positive earnings per share growth over the past two years. We feel that this trend should continue. During the past fiscal year, CSX CORP increased its bottom line by earning $1.93 versus $1.83 in the prior year. This year, the market expects an improvement in earnings ($2.15 versus $1.93). Despite its growing revenue, the company underperformed as compared with the industry average of 14.0%. Since the same quarter one year prior, revenues slightly increased by 5.3%. This growth in revenue appears to have trickled down to the company's bottom line, improving the earnings per share. Net operating cash flow has increased to $1,041.00 million or 35.54% when compared to the same quarter last year. The firm also exceeded the industry average cash flow growth rate of 7.56%. You can view the full analysis from the report here: CSX Ratings Report
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