BMO Capital Markets Cuts Paychex (NASDAQ:PAYX) Price Target to $140.00

Paychex (NASDAQ:PAYX) had its target price reduced by stock analysts at BMO Capital Markets from $143.00 to $140.00 in a research note issued on Wednesday, Marketbeat reports. The brokerage presently has a “market perform” rating on the business services provider’s stock. BMO Capital Markets’ price objective points to a potential upside of 13.43% from the company’s previous close.

Several other research analysts have also commented on the stock. UBS Group reduced their price objective on shares of Paychex from $148.00 to $140.00 and set a “neutral” rating for the company in a research note on Wednesday, September 17th. Royal Bank Of Canada set a $165.00 target price on shares of Paychex and gave the stock a “sector perform” rating in a research report on Tuesday, June 24th. Jefferies Financial Group set a $130.00 target price on shares of Paychex in a research report on Tuesday. Wolfe Research dropped their target price on shares of Paychex from $145.00 to $140.00 and set an “underperform” rating on the stock in a research report on Friday, September 26th. Finally, Stifel Nicolaus dropped their target price on shares of Paychex from $152.00 to $142.00 and set a “hold” rating on the stock in a research report on Monday, September 22nd. Eleven analysts have rated the stock with a Hold rating and two have given a Sell rating to the company’s stock. According to MarketBeat, the company presently has a consensus rating of “Reduce” and an average target price of $142.83.

Paychex Trading Down 0.5%

NASDAQ PAYX opened at $123.42 on Wednesday. The company has a quick ratio of 1.28, a current ratio of 1.27 and a debt-to-equity ratio of 1.15. The firm has a market cap of $44.42 billion, a PE ratio of 27.73, a price-to-earnings-growth ratio of 2.83 and a beta of 0.92. The company has a 50 day moving average price of $136.13 and a 200 day moving average price of $144.55. Paychex has a 52 week low of $119.02 and a 52 week high of $161.24.

Paychex (NASDAQ:PAYX) last posted its quarterly earnings data on Tuesday, September 30th. The business services provider reported $1.22 EPS for the quarter, topping the consensus estimate of $1.20 by $0.02. The firm had revenue of $1.54 billion during the quarter, compared to analyst estimates of $1.54 billion. Paychex had a net margin of 27.85% and a return on equity of 45.17%. Paychex’s revenue was up 16.8% on a year-over-year basis. During the same quarter in the previous year, the business posted $1.16 EPS. Paychex has set its FY 2026 guidance at 5.428-5.528 EPS. As a group, sell-side analysts forecast that Paychex will post 4.99 EPS for the current fiscal year.

Insider Buying and Selling at Paychex

In other news, CEO John B. Gibson sold 12,370 shares of the company’s stock in a transaction on Wednesday, July 16th. The shares were sold at an average price of $141.92, for a total value of $1,755,550.40. Following the sale, the chief executive officer directly owned 81,755 shares of the company’s stock, valued at $11,602,669.60. This represents a 13.14% decrease in their position. The transaction was disclosed in a legal filing with the Securities & Exchange Commission, which is accessible through the SEC website. Also, Chairman Martin Mucci sold 97,526 shares of the company’s stock in a transaction on Thursday, July 10th. The shares were sold at an average price of $145.17, for a total transaction of $14,157,849.42. Following the completion of the sale, the chairman directly owned 446,917 shares in the company, valued at $64,878,940.89. This trade represents a 17.91% decrease in their ownership of the stock. The disclosure for this sale can be found here. 0.80% of the stock is owned by corporate insiders.

Institutional Trading of Paychex

Several large investors have recently made changes to their positions in PAYX. NewSquare Capital LLC boosted its holdings in shares of Paychex by 83.8% in the 2nd quarter. NewSquare Capital LLC now owns 215 shares of the business services provider’s stock valued at $31,000 after acquiring an additional 98 shares during the last quarter. Alpine Bank Wealth Management purchased a new stake in Paychex during the first quarter worth $34,000. MorganRosel Wealth Management LLC purchased a new stake in Paychex during the first quarter worth $34,000. Quarry LP purchased a new stake in Paychex during the first quarter worth $34,000. Finally, Tsfg LLC boosted its holdings in Paychex by 122.3% during the first quarter. Tsfg LLC now owns 229 shares of the business services provider’s stock worth $35,000 after buying an additional 126 shares in the last quarter. 83.47% of the stock is owned by hedge funds and other institutional investors.

About Paychex

Paychex, Inc, together with its subsidiaries, provides integrated human capital management solutions (HCM) for payroll, benefits, human resources (HR), and insurance services for small to medium-sized businesses in the United States, Europe, and India. It offers payroll processing services; payroll tax administration services; employee payment services; and regulatory compliance services, such as new-hire reporting and garnishment processing.