On August 14, Paycom rose 5.02% in regular trading, trading at $221.84/share, with turnover of $164 million. The rally follows the company's Q2 earnings report that substantially exceeded Wall Street expectations, combined with multiple investment banks raising their price targets.

Paycom reported Q2 adjusted EPS of $2.78, beating the consensus estimate of $2.38 by 16.8% and up from $2.06 a year earlier. Revenue rose to $531.2 million from $483.6 million year-over-year, surpassing analyst projections of $513.1 million. The company also raised its full-year revenue guidance to $2.197 billion to $2.212 billion, above the FactSet consensus of $2.188 billion.

Following the results, UBS raised its price target from $195 to $205 while maintaining a Buy rating, and Deutsche Bank significantly lifted its target from $140 to $205, maintaining a Hold rating. The current analyst consensus mean price target stands at $202.20.

Within the Human Resource & Employment Services sector, the overall sector showed broad strength. Among peers, First Advantage Corp. rose 5.43%, Paychex rose 4.11%, Paylocity rose 3.88%, and Automatic Data Processing rose 2.37%.

(The above content is based on publicly available market information, generated by a program or algorithm, and is intended solely as a stock movement alert. It does not constitute investment advice or a basis for trading decisions.)