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Strength Seen in USCB Financial (USCB): Can Its 7.3% Jump Turn into More Strength?

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USCB Financial Holdings, Inc. (USCB - Free Report) shares soared 7.3% in the last trading session to close at $14.79. The move was backed by solid volume with far more shares changing hands than in a normal session. This compares to the stock's 14% gain over the past four weeks.

Shares of USCB Financial rallied for the fourth straight trading session and touched a 52-week high of $14.97. Encouraging inflation numbers and cooling employment data have increased the chances of the Federal Reserve cutting the interest rates as early as during the September FOMC meeting. As the rates come down, banks’ funding costs will stabilize or move lower eventually. Also, demand for loans is expected to improve. Hence, the investors turned bullish on banking sector stocks, driving USCB higher.

This company is expected to post quarterly earnings of $0.24 per share in its upcoming report, which represents a year-over-year change of +14.3%. Revenues are expected to be $18.56 million, up 15.9% 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 USCB Financial, 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 USCB 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 >>>>

USCB Financial is a member of the Zacks Banks - Southeast industry. One other stock in the same industry, Customers Bancorp (CUBI - Free Report) , finished the last trading session 8% higher at $63.33. CUBI has returned 28.3% over the past month.

For Customers Bancorp, the consensus EPS estimate for the upcoming report has changed +1.2% over the past month to $1.45. This represents a change of -12.1% from what the company reported a year ago. Customers Bancorp currently has a Zacks Rank of #3 (Hold).


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