Oracle's earnings to highlight strength in cloud business services

When Oracle (NYSE:ORCL) delivers its fiscal third-quarter results after the close of trading Thursday, the business-software giant will report will come amid what has been a period of resurgence for the company's shares on Wall Street.

Since the start of the year, Oracle's (ORCL) shares have risen more than 8%, and continue to trade near the 52-week-high of $91.22 that the stock reached on February 2. As Oracle's (ORCL) stock has risen, enthusiasm about its earnings and revenue prospects has also grown among analysts that follow the company.

Oracle (ORCL) is currently forecast to earn $1.20 a share, excluding one-time items, on $12.4B in revenue for its fiscal third quarter. During the same period a year ago, Oracle (ORCL) earned $1.13 a share, on $10.5B in revenue.

On Tuesday, Monness, Crespi, Hardt analyst Brian White said he expects Oracle (ORCL) to report upbeat quarterly results, but that the company also faces a "long runway" ahead as deal momentum for its Oracle Cloud business continues to grow.

In February, Oracle (ORCL) moved to expand its cloud services business with a deal to invest $1.5B in Saudi Arabia to build up its cloud-business presence in the country.

Meanwhile, Seeking Alpha author Jonathan Weber said that there is strong evidence that Oracle will beat Wall Street's estimates with its third-quarter earnings and sales results.