Upwork UPWK shares rallied 26.7% in the last trading session to close at $12.73. 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 5.6% loss over the past four weeks.
Upwork is benefiting from an enhanced enterprise strategy, strong demand for its services, and advancements in AI innovation. As a result, the company has increased its guidance to $194 million for its preliminary third-quarter 2024 results, surpassing its earlier forecast of $179 million to $184 million.
This online freelance marketplace operator is expected to post quarterly earnings of $0.23 per share in its upcoming report, which represents a year-over-year change of +9.5%. Revenues are expected to be $182.18 million, up 3.7% 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 Upwork, 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 UPWK 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 >>>>
Upwork is a member of the Zacks Internet - Services industry. One other stock in the same industry, Marchex MCHX, finished the last trading session 2.8% lower at $1.74. MCHX has returned -2.5% over the past month.
Marchex's consensus EPS estimate for the upcoming report has remained unchanged over the past month at -$0.01. Compared to the company's year-ago EPS, this represents no change. Marchex currently boasts a Zacks Rank of #3 (Hold).
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