Growth investors focus on stocks that are seeing above-average financial growth, as this feature helps these securities garner the market's attention and deliver solid returns. But finding a growth stock that can live up to its true potential can be a tough task.

By their very nature, these stocks carry above-average risk and volatility. Moreover, if a company's growth story is over or nearing its end, betting on it could lead to significant loss.

However, it's pretty easy to find cutting-edge growth stocks with the help of the Zacks Growth Style Score (part of the Zacks Style Scores system), which looks beyond the traditional growth attributes to analyze a company's real growth prospects.

Our proprietary system currently recommends Erie Indemnity (ERIE) as one such stock. This company not only has a favorable Growth Score, but also carries a top Zacks Rank.

Research shows that stocks carrying the best growth features consistently beat the market. And for stocks that have a combination of a Growth Score of A or B and a Zacks Rank #1 (Strong Buy) or 2 (Buy), returns are even better.

While there are numerous reasons why the stock of this insurance company is a great growth pick right now, we have highlighted three of the most important factors below:

Earnings Growth

Arguably nothing is more important than earnings growth, as surging profit levels is what most investors are after. For growth investors, double-digit earnings growth is highly preferable, as it is often perceived as an indication of strong prospects (and stock price gains) for the company under consideration.

While the historical EPS growth rate for Erie Indemnity is 15.3%, investors should actually focus on the projected growth. The company's EPS is expected to grow 24.9% this year, crushing the industry average, which calls for EPS growth of 14.5%.

Impressive Asset Utilization Ratio

Growth investors often overlook asset utilization ratio, also known as sales-to-total-assets (S/TA) ratio, but it is an important feature of a real growth stock. This metric exhibits how efficiently a firm is utilizing its assets to generate sales.

Right now, Erie Indemnity has an S/TA ratio of 1.38, which means that the company gets $1.38 in sales for each dollar in assets. Comparing this to the industry average of 0.38, it can be said that the company is more efficient.

In addition to efficiency in generating sales, sales growth plays an important role. And Erie Indemnity is well positioned from a sales growth perspective too. The company's sales are expected to grow 11.7% this year versus the industry average of 8.4%.

Promising Earnings Estimate Revisions

Beyond the metrics outlined above, investors should consider the trend in earnings estimate revisions. A positive trend is a plus here. Empirical research shows that there is a strong correlation between trends in earnings estimate revisions and near-term stock price movements.

The current-year earnings estimates for Erie Indemnity have been revising upward. The Zacks Consensus Estimate for the current year has surged 0.3% over the past month.

Bottom Line

While the overall earnings estimate revisions have made Erie Indemnity a Zacks Rank #2 stock, it has earned itself a Growth Score of A based on a number of factors, including the ones discussed above.

You can see the complete list of today's Zacks #1 Rank (Strong Buy) stocks here.

This combination positions Erie Indemnity well for outperformance, so growth investors may want to bet on it.

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Erie Indemnity Company (ERIE) : Free Stock Analysis Report

This article originally published on Zacks Investment Research (zacks.com).

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