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ELEVATE Benefits ABM's Organic Growth Despite Rising Expenses

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ABM Industries Incorporated (ABM - Free Report) stock has gained 19.5%, outperforming the 11% rally of the industry it belongs to and the 8.6% rise of the Zacks S&P 500 composite in the past six months.

ABM reported impressive third-quarter fiscal 2024 results. EPS (excluding 86 cents from non-recurring items) was 94 cents, which outpaced the Zacks Consensus Estimate by 10.6% and gained 19% on a year-over-year basis. Total revenues of $2.1 billion surpassed the consensus mark by 2.7% and increased 3.3% from the year-ago quarter.

How is ABM Industries Doing?

ELEVATE, which is ABM’s multi-year comprehensive strategic plan, aims to provide clients with offerings that improve transparency and efficiencies, develop its talent management system capabilities, expand data usage, and modernize the digital ecosystem. ABM anticipates ELEVATE  to continue accelerating its organic growth, enhancing its strategic and comprehensive positioning, and reinforcing profitability.

ABM Industries' growth strategy involves strategic acquisitions and organic investments. The recent acquisition of Quality Uptime Services, Inc. allows ABM’s Mission Critical Solutions to offer comprehensive and complementary critical infrastructure solutions for data centers and similar essential services. RavenVolt, which was acquired in 2022, helped ABM expand its footprint in potential geographies and end markets through strategic acquisitions. RavenVolt’s addition has expanded ABM’s Technical Solutions service offerings, improving its foothold in EV infrastructure, power and bundled energy solutions markets.

ABM continues to reap the benefits of its comprehensive transformational initiative called “2020 Vision” launched in 2015. This initiative aims to attain profitable growth in the long run through an industry-based go-to-market approach. As part of this initiative, ABM Industries has centralized key functional areas, reinforced sales capabilities, and begun investing in service delivery tools and processes for supporting standard operating practices that are crucial for success in the long term.

2020 Vision initiative has enhanced the company’s Janitorial, Parking, Facilities Services, Building & Energy Solutions, and Airline Services offerings, and strengthened its position as a leading integrated facilities management company.

 

We are also impressed with ABM Industries’ motive toward rewarding its shareholders through dividend payments and share repurchases. The company paid out dividends of $57.5 million in 2023, $51.9 million in 2022 and $51 million in 2021. ABM returned $138.1 million in share repurchases in 2023 and $97.5 million in 2022. The company did not repurchase any shares in 2021. Such actions indicate its commitment to create value for shareholders and underline its confidence in its business. These initiatives not only instill investors’ confidence but also positively impact the bottom line.

Despite all the above efforts taken by ABM Industries to boost its capabilities, it has had to deal with rising operating expenses in the past two years. In fiscal 2023, operating expenses increased 4.1% year over year. The same rose 28.5% year over year in fiscal 2022. Increasing operating expenses can have significant negative impacts on the bottom line.

Zacks Rank & Stocks to Consider

ABM Industries currently carries a Zacks Rank #3 (Hold).

Some better-ranked stocks in the broader Zacks Business Services sector are AppLovin (APP - Free Report) and Evertec (EVTC - Free Report) .

AppLovin flaunts a Zacks Rank of 1 (Strong Buy) at present. You can see the complete list of today’s Zacks #1 Rank stocks here.

APP has a long-term earnings growth expectation of 20%. It delivered a trailing four-quarter earnings surprise of 21.1%, on average.

Evertec sports a Zacks Rank of 1 at present. It has a long-term earnings growth expectation of 8%.

EVTC delivered a trailing four-quarter earnings surprise of 11.1%, on average.


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