News Flash: Analysts Just Made A Notable Upgrade To Their Peoples Bancorp Inc. (NASDAQ:PEBO) Forecasts

Celebrations may be in order for Peoples Bancorp Inc. (NASDAQ:PEBO) shareholders, with the analysts delivering a significant upgrade to their statutory estimates for the company. The consensus estimated revenue numbers rose, with their view now clearly much more bullish on the company's business prospects.

Following the upgrade, the latest consensus from Peoples Bancorp's five analysts is for revenues of US$237m in 2021, which would reflect a major 35% improvement in sales compared to the last 12 months. Per-share earnings are expected to shoot up 42% to US$2.47. Previously, the analysts had been modelling revenues of US$203m and earnings per share (EPS) of US$2.45 in 2021. It seems analyst sentiment has certainly become more bullish on revenues, even though they haven't changed their view on earnings per share.

Check out our latest analysis for Peoples Bancorp

Analysts increased their price target 8.3% to US$37.17, perhaps signalling that higher revenues are a strong leading indicator for Peoples Bancorp's valuation. That's not the only conclusion we can draw from this data however, as some investors also like to consider the spread in estimates when evaluating analyst price targets. There are some variant perceptions on Peoples Bancorp, with the most bullish analyst valuing it at US$40.00 and the most bearish at US$33.00 per share. With such a narrow range of valuations, analysts apparently share similar views on what they think the business is worth.

Taking a look at the bigger picture now, one of the ways we can understand these forecasts is to see how they compare to both past performance and industry growth estimates. It's clear from the latest estimates that Peoples Bancorp's rate of growth is expected to accelerate meaningfully, with the forecast 35% annualised revenue growth to the end of 2021 noticeably faster than its historical growth of 6.4% p.a. over the past five years. By contrast, our data suggests that other companies (with analyst coverage) in a similar industry are forecast to grow their revenue at 7.1% per year. Factoring in the forecast acceleration in revenue, it's pretty clear that Peoples Bancorp is expected to grow much faster than its industry.

The Bottom Line

The most important thing to take away is that there's been no major change in sentiment, with analysts reconfirming that earnings per share are expected to continue performing in line with their prior expectations. They also upgraded their revenue estimates for this year, and sales are expected to grow faster than the wider market. There was also an increase in the price target, suggesting that there is more optimism baked into the forecasts than there was previously. Seeing the dramatic upgrade to this year's forecasts, it might be time to take another look at Peoples Bancorp.

Better yet, our automated discounted cash flow calculation (DCF) suggests Peoples Bancorp could be moderately undervalued. For more information, you can click through to our platform to learn more about our valuation approach.

Of course, seeing company management invest large sums of money in a stock can be just as useful as knowing whether analysts are upgrading their estimates. So you may also wish to search this free list of stocks that insiders are buying.

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This article by Simply Wall St is general in nature. It does not constitute a recommendation to buy or sell any stock, and does not take account of your objectives, or your financial situation. We aim to bring you long-term focused analysis driven by fundamental data. Note that our analysis may not factor in the latest price-sensitive company announcements or qualitative material. Simply Wall St has no position in any stocks mentioned.
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