CRA International (CRAI) shares ended the last trading session 3% higher at $202.84. The jump came on an impressive volume with a higher-than-average number of shares changing hands in the session. This compares to the stock's 9% gain over the past four weeks.
The stock is benefiting from strong momentum carried into the year, marked by record-breaking performance and broad-based practice growth.
This consulting firm is expected to post quarterly earnings of $1.83 per share in its upcoming report, which represents no change from the year-ago quarter. Revenues are expected to be $179.7 million, up 4.8% from the year-ago quarter.
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 CRA, 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 CRAI 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 >>>>
CRA belongs to the Zacks Consulting Services industry. Another stock from the same industry, Stantec (STN), closed the last trading session 1.2% higher at $111.81. Over the past month, STN has returned 3.5%.
For Stantec, the consensus EPS estimate for the upcoming report has remained unchanged over the past month at $0.98. This represents a change of +19.5% from what the company reported a year ago. Stantec currently has a Zacks Rank of #3 (Hold).
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Charles River Associates (CRAI): Free Stock Analysis Report Stantec Inc. (STN): Free Stock Analysis ReportThis article originally published on Zacks Investment Research (zacks.com).
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