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Morgan Stanley (NYSE:MS) investors will be delighted, with the company turning in some strong numbers with its latest results. Morgan Stanley beat earnings, with revenues hitting US$48b, ahead of expectations, and statutory earnings per share outperforming analyst reckonings by a solid 11%. Earnings are an important time for investors, as they can track a company's performance, look at what the analysts are forecasting for next year, and see if there's been a change in sentiment towards the company. With this in mind, we've gathered the latest statutory forecasts to see what the analysts are expecting for next year.
View our latest analysis for Morgan Stanley
Taking into account the latest results, the most recent consensus for Morgan Stanley from 21 analysts is for revenues of US$50.6b in 2021 which, if met, would be a satisfactory 5.0% increase on its sales over the past 12 months. Statutory earnings per share are expected to drop 14% to US$5.64 in the same period. Yet prior to the latest earnings, the analysts had been anticipated revenues of US$46.5b and earnings per share (EPS) of US$5.32 in 2021. It looks like there's been a modest increase in sentiment following the latest results, withthe analysts becoming a bit more optimistic in their predictions for both revenues and earnings.
It will come as no surprise to learn that the analysts have increased their price target for Morgan Stanley 6.1% to US$78.90on the back of these upgrades. The consensus price target is just an average of individual analyst targets, so - it could be handy to see how wide the range of underlying estimates is. The most optimistic Morgan Stanley analyst has a price target of US$95.00 per share, while the most pessimistic values it at US$50.00. There are definitely some different views on the stock, but the range of estimates is not wide enough as to imply that the situation is unforecastable, in our view.
Looking at the bigger picture now, one of the ways we can make sense of these forecasts is to see how they measure up against both past performance and industry growth estimates. We can infer from the latest estimates that forecasts expect a continuation of Morgan Stanley'shistorical trends, as next year's 5.0% revenue growth is roughly in line with 6.1% annual revenue growth over the past five years. By contrast, our data suggests that other companies (with analyst coverage) in a similar industry are forecast to see their revenues grow 6.7% per year. So it's pretty clear that Morgan Stanley is expected to grow slower than similar companies in the same industry.