Paychex Earnings: Positive Earnings Streak Continues

S&P 500 (NYSE:SPY) component Paychex Inc. (NASDAQ:PAYX) reported its results for the first quarter. Paychex is a provider of comprehensive payroll, human resource, and benefits outsourcing solutions for small and medium sized businesses.

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Paychex Inc. Earnings Cheat Sheet

Results: Net income for Paychex Inc. rose to $153.1 million (42 cents per share) vs. $148.9 million (41 cents per share) in the same quarter a year earlier. This marks a rise of 2.8% from the year-earlier quarter.

Revenue: Rose 2.9% to $568.1 million from the year-earlier quarter.

Actual vs. Wall St. Expectations: Paychex Inc. beat the mean analyst estimate of 41 cents per share. Analysts were expecting revenue of $557.7 million.

Quoting Management: Martin Mucci, President and Chief Executive Officer, commented, “The first quarter has fiscal 2013 off to a good start with results meeting our expectations. Our client base continued to improve, checks per payroll continued to increase, and our client retention is near a historic high. Growth rates reflect fluctuations in the frequency of payroll processing compared to the same period last year. For fiscal 2013, we have reaffirmed our financial guidance.”

Key Stats:

The company has now seen net income rise in three straight quarters. In the fourth quarter of the last fiscal year, net income rose 3.7% and in the third quarter of the last fiscal year, the figure rose 3.7%.

Revenue has risen for the last four quarters. Revenue increased 5.9% to $540.7 million in the fourth quarter of the last fiscal year. The figure rose 7.5% in the third quarter of the last fiscal year from the year earlier and climbed 7% in the second quarter of the last fiscal year from the year-ago quarter.

The company beat estimates last quarter after meeting expectations in the fourth quarter of the last fiscal year with net income of 34 cents per share.

Looking Forward: Expectations for the second quarter have not changed from 41 cents. In the past month, the average estimate for the fiscal year has fallen from $1.63 per share to $1.61.

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(Company fundamentals provided by Xignite Financials. Earnings estimates provided by Zacks)

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