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Icon PLC (ICLR) Surges 3%: Is This an Indication of Further Gains?

Icon PLC ICLR shares rallied 3% in the last trading session to close at $232.99. This move can be attributable to notable volume with a higher number of shares being traded than in a typical session. This compares to the stock's 6.2% loss over the past four weeks.

Icon PLC scored a strong price rise on investors’ optimism surrounding the company’s impressive second-quarter 2022 results. The company’s adjusted earnings per share for the quarter surpassed the Zacks Consensus Estimate by 2.5% and rose 34.9% on a year over year basis. Revenues too beat the consensus mark by 0.5% and grew 122.1% year on year. The Zacks Consensus Estimate for the company’s full-year 2022 revenues is pegged at $7.75 billion, suggesting a 41.5% rise from the year-ago period. Meanwhile, earnings for the full-year is pegged at $11.7, indicating a 21.2% increase from the 2021 comparable figure.

Recently, the company released its 2021 Environmental, Social and Governance (ESG) Report. Per management, the latest ESG report demonstrates Icon’s commitment to delivering positive impacts for its colleagues, customers, communities and patients. This too has instilled investors’ optimism.

This contract research organization is expected to post quarterly earnings of $2.96 per share in its upcoming report, which represents a year-over-year change of +16.1%. Revenues are expected to be $1.94 billion, up 4% from the year-ago quarter.

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Earnings and revenue growth expectations certainly give a good sense of the potential strength in a stock, but empirical research shows that trends in earnings estimate revisions are strongly correlated with near-term stock price movements.

For Icon PLC, the consensus EPS estimate for the quarter has remained unchanged over the last 30 days. And a stock's price usually doesn't keep moving higher in the absence of any trend in earnings estimate revisions. So, make sure to keep an eye on ICLR going forward to see if this recent jump can turn into more strength down the road.

The stock currently carries a Zacks Rank #3 (Hold). You can see the complete list of today's Zacks Rank #1 (Strong Buy) stocks here >>>>

Icon PLC is a member of the Zacks Medical Services industry. One other stock in the same industry, CareDx CDNA, finished the last trading session 2% higher at $19.58. CDNA has returned -19% over the past month.

CareDx's consensus EPS estimate for the upcoming report has remained unchanged over the past month at -$0.14. Compared to the company's year-ago EPS, this represents a change of -300%. CareDx currently boasts a Zacks Rank of #4 (Sell).


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