IBM is scheduled to release its third-quarter earnings on Wednesday after the market closes. Here's what you need to know.

NET INCOME: The company is expected to report a profit of $2.34 billion, according to analysts polled by FactSet, compared with a profit of $1.74 billion a year earlier.

ADJUSTED EARNINGS: Analysts expect adjusted earnings of $2.85 a share, compared with $2.65 a share a year prior.

REVENUE: Revenue is expected to grow to $16.82 billion, up from $16.33 billion.

Shares of IBM have fallen 19% this year, and were recently up 1.9% at $240.84

WHAT TO WATCH:

-- Big Blue needs to regain investor confidence after a second quarter showing so bad that the company soft-launched its results a week in advance to soften the blow. The company last quarter reported a 7% drop in infrastructure revenue, driven by tens of mainframe deals that failed to close in the second quarter as customers rotated their spending toward artificial-intelligence infrastructure. CFO Jim Kavanaugh told The Wall Street Journal that about a third of those slipped deals had been closed by the time IBM reported its second-quarter results in July, and investors will be listening closely for updates on whether the rest have closed.

-- The third-quarter print might offer a sigh of relief for IBM. Closed deals from the second-quarter should boost infrastructure revenue, while the software and consulting segments face relatively low bars, Morgan Stanley analysts wrote in a recent note. But the focus may shift to the fourth quarter, where the analysts see a tougher setup: a higher revenue bar against a tough macro picture, a difficult phase of the mainframe cycle, and fierce competition in AI software. "All-told, while the 3Q earnings setup should be viewed as neutral to positive (i.e. some relief pushed deals from 2Q land in 3Q), the setup thereafter is more challenging, in our view," the analysts write.