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Shareholders might have noticed that Motorola Solutions, Inc. (NYSE:MSI) filed its annual result this time last week. The early response was not positive, with shares down 8.6% to US$438 in the past week. Motorola Solutions reported US$11b in revenue, roughly in line with analyst forecasts, although statutory earnings per share (EPS) of US$9.23 beat expectations, being 2.8% higher than what the analysts expected. 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.
See our latest analysis for Motorola Solutions
Following the latest results, Motorola Solutions' twelve analysts are now forecasting revenues of US$11.4b in 2025. This would be a satisfactory 5.8% improvement in revenue compared to the last 12 months. Per-share earnings are expected to jump 37% to US$12.93. Before this earnings report, the analysts had been forecasting revenues of US$11.5b and earnings per share (EPS) of US$12.33 in 2025. So the consensus seems to have become somewhat more optimistic on Motorola Solutions' earnings potential following these results.
There's been no major changes to the consensus price target of US$519, suggesting that the improved earnings per share outlook is not enough to have a long-term positive impact on the stock's valuation. Fixating on a single price target can be unwise though, since the consensus target is effectively the average of analyst price targets. As a result, some investors like to look at the range of estimates to see if there are any diverging opinions on the company's valuation. The most optimistic Motorola Solutions analyst has a price target of US$600 per share, while the most pessimistic values it at US$460. Even so, with a relatively close grouping of estimates, it looks like the analysts are quite confident in their valuations, suggesting Motorola Solutions is an easy business to forecast or the the analysts are all using similar assumptions.
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. It's pretty clear that there is an expectation that Motorola Solutions' revenue growth will slow down substantially, with revenues to the end of 2025 expected to display 5.8% growth on an annualised basis. This is compared to a historical growth rate of 7.9% over the past five years. Compare this against other companies (with analyst forecasts) in the industry, which are in aggregate expected to see revenue growth of 8.5% annually. Factoring in the forecast slowdown in growth, it seems obvious that Motorola Solutions is also expected to grow slower than other industry participants.