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Paylocity Holding (PCTY) Q3 Earnings: What's in the Cards?

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Paylocity Holding Corporation (PCTY - Free Report) is set to report third-quarter 2017 results on May 4. Last quarter, the company delivered a positive earnings surprise of 75%. Let's see how things are shaping up for this announcement.

Factors at Play

Paylocity reported better-than-expected second-quarter results. Revenues also increased on a year-over-year basis driven by solid sales and operational implementation.

We remain positive about Paylocity’s regular investments in SaaS technology. Notably, over the past few quarters, clients moving from traditional payroll service providers to the company’s SaaS-based services generated a significant portion of Paylocity’s revenues. Hence, we believe that regular investments in technological upgrades, along with product innovations, will continue to boost the company’s top line in the long run. Such initiatives are also likely to have a positive impact on its forthcoming results.

Moreover, higher adoption of Paylocity’s ACA dashboard application, which specializes in tracking employee count, employee status and health care plan affordability, will act as a tailwind.

However, competition in the payroll processing sector from new entrants as well as existing players such as Automatic Data Processing, Inc. (ADP - Free Report) , Oracle Corporation and SAP SE remains a major headwind.

Earnings Whispers

Our proven model does not conclusively show that Paylocitywill beat earnings estimates this quarter. This is because a stock needs to have both a positive Earnings ESP and a Zacks Rank #1 (Strong Buy), 2 (Buy) or 3 (Hold) for this to happen. That is not the case here as you will see below.

Zacks ESP: Paylocity’s ESP is 0.00% since both the Most Accurate estimate and the Zacks Consensus Estimate stand at 12 cents. You can uncover the best stocks to buy or sell before they’re reported with our Earnings ESP Filter

Zacks Rank: Avnet carries a Zacks Rank #3, which increases the predictive power of ESP. However, we need to have a positive ESP to be confident of an earnings surprise.

We caution against stocks with a Zacks Rank #4 or 5 (Sell rated) going into the earnings announcement, especially when the company is witnessing negative estimate revisions.

Stocks to Consider

Here are some companies you may want to consider as our model shows that they have the right combination of elements to post an earnings beat this quarter:

Moody's Corporation (MCO - Free Report) , with an Earnings ESP of +7.38% and a Zacks Rank #2. You can see the complete list of today’s Zacks #1 Rank stocks here.

MSCI Inc (MSCI - Free Report) , with an Earnings ESP of +1.19% and a Zacks Rank #3

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