What Happened?
Shares of professional services firm Huron Consulting Group (NASDAQ: HURN) jumped 12% in the afternoon session after the company reported third-quarter financial results that surpassed analyst expectations and raised its full-year earnings forecast. Revenue for the quarter climbed 16.7% year on year to $441.3 million, beating analyst estimates by 2.3%. In addition, its adjusted earnings per share of $2.10 was 12.3% higher than Wall Street's consensus. Following the strong results, Huron raised its adjusted earnings guidance for the full year to $7.60 per share at the midpoint. While the company reaffirmed its full-year revenue forecast, the improved profit outlook signaled confidence in its operational efficiency and margin management.
Is now the time to buy Huron? Access our full analysis report here.
What Is The Market Telling Us
Huron’s shares are not very volatile and have only had 9 moves greater than 5% over the last year. Moves this big are rare for Huron and indicate this news significantly impacted the market’s perception of the business.
The biggest move we wrote about over the last year was 3 months ago when the stock dropped 6.2% on the news that a surprisingly weak U.S. jobs report was released, fueling concerns about a slowing economy. The U.S. economy added only 73,000 jobs, falling significantly short of economists' expectations, while figures for May and June were revised down, erasing 258,000 previously reported jobs. The professional and business services industry itself shed 14,000 jobs. This data points to a cooling labor market, fueling concerns of a slowing economy. A weaker economic outlook often leads to reduced corporate spending on key services like IT consulting and professional staffing, which directly impacts the sector's revenue and growth prospects. The report immediately increased investor expectations of an interest rate cut by the Federal Reserve.
Huron is up 37.6% since the beginning of the year, and at $169.73 per share, has set a new 52-week high. Investors who bought $1,000 worth of Huron’s shares 5 years ago would now be looking at an investment worth $4,338.
Here at StockStory, we certainly understand the potential of thematic investing. Diverse winners from Microsoft (MSFT) to Alphabet (GOOG), Coca-Cola (KO) to Monster Beverage (MNST) could all have been identified as promising growth stories with a megatrend driving the growth. So, in that spirit, we’ve identified a relatively under-the-radar profitable growth stock benefiting from the rise of AI, available to you FREE via this link.
