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IQVIA Holdings (IQV) Hits 52-Week High: What's Driving It?

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Shares of IQVIA Holdings Inc. (IQV - Free Report) scaled a 52-week high of $203.79 in the trading session on Apr 6, before closing a tad lower at $203.57.

The company’s shares have charted a solid trajectory in recent times, appreciating 59.2% over the past year, much ahead of 33.7% growth of the industry it belongs to and 51.2% surge of the Zacks S&P composite index.

Notably, IQVIA Holdings has witnessed a 7.1% rise in share price since it posted fourth-quarter 2020 results.

Let’s find out what’s supporting the uptick.

Upbeat EPS 2021 Guidance

IQVIA raised its 2020 adjusted earnings per share guidance. The company now projects adjusted earnings between $7.89 and $8.20 compared with the prior guidance of $7.77-$8.08 per share. The current Zacks Consensus Estimate of $8.01 lies within the updated guidance.

Consecutive Earnings & Revenue Beat

IQVIA Holdings came up with better-than-expected earnings and revenue performance in all four quarters of 2020. The company’s bottom line continued to benefit from improvement in operational efficiency and decline in interest expenses. Strength across the company’s Technology & Analytics Solutions segment boosts the top line.

Solid Technological Suite

IQVIA Holdings has a strong healthcare-specific global IT infrastructure, analytics-driven clinical development capabilities, a robust real-world solutions ecosystem and a growing set of proprietary clinical and commercial applications that allows it to grow and retain relationships with healthcare stakeholders. The company’s combined offerings of research and development, and commercial services has been helping it to develop trusted relationships, resulting in a diversified base of over 10,000 clients in over 100 countries. A set of robust capabilities places IQVIA strongly in the life sciences space and positions it to make most of the market opportunities.

Zacks Rank and Stocks to Consider

IQVIA Holdings currently carries a Zacks Rank #3 (Hold). You can see the complete list of today’s Zacks #1 Rank (Strong Buy) stocks here.

Some better-ranked stocks in the broader Zacks Business Servicessector are Omnicom (OMC - Free Report) , Charles River Associates (CRAI - Free Report) and Gartner (IT - Free Report) , each carrying a Zacks Rank #2 (Buy).

The long-term expected earnings per share (three to five years) growth rate for Omnicom, Charles River Associates and Gartner is 9.3%, 13% and 13.5%, respectively.

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