PAYX
PAYCHEX INCEvidence as of 2026-09-03Overview · PAYCHEX INC
Paychex, Inc. provides integrated human capital management solutions for human resources (HR), payroll, benefits, and insurance services for small to medium-sized businesses in the United States, Europe, and India. It offers payroll processing services; payroll tax administration services; employee payment services; and regulatory compliance services, such as new-hire reporting and garnishment processing. The company…
Management team
- Mr. Frank Fiorille · Vice President of Risk, Compliance & Data AnalyticsFind on LinkedIn
- Mr. Robert Lewis Schrader · Senior VP & CFOFind on LinkedIn
- Mr. Robert L. Schrader · Senior VP & CFOFind on LinkedIn
- Mr. Christopher Simmons · VP, Controller, Treasurer & Principal Accounting OfficerFind on LinkedIn
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Links open LinkedIn searches, not verified profiles. Team data from our market-data vendor's company profile.
Moneyta sentiment
Where the published evidence leans after the desk debated it — not a rating or a recommendation.
+0.3 on a −2 to +2 scale.
What builds the score
Solid bars are analyst rubric scores; faded bars are computed directly from data. Claims dropped in debate count for nothing; weakened claims count at half weight.
Editor's note
Written after the debate settled — the rest of the page is the evidence behind it.
The evidence balance is Mixed (+0.3 of a possible +2; confidence high). The surviving GAAP figures show revenues of $ 1,540,000,000 in Q1 2026 (fiscal quarter ended 2025-08-31), $ 1,557,600,000 in Q2 2026 (fiscal quarter ended 2025-11-30), and $ 1,808,900,000 in Q3 2026 (fiscal quarter ended 2026-02-28), with diluted EPS of $ 1.06, $ 1.10, and $ 1.56 in those quarters respectively. Trailing twelve-month metrics reported include FCF $ 2,161,000,000, EBITDA $ 2,831,100,000, P/FCF 20.63, EV/EBITDA 16.8, and P/E 24.08 (EPS ttm 5.15).
Market and ownership signals survive alongside the financials: six-month momentum +32.5% (89th percentile), price above the 50- and 200-day SMAs (price vs SMA50 +8.0%, vs SMA200 +21.6%) with a golden cross present as of 2026-09-02, trailing-twelve-month dividend yield 3.66% with three-year dividend growth +10.6%, and elevated short-term realized volatility (90‑day annualized 30.9%). Share-count metrics show weighted-average diluted shares declining across the quarters (361,900,000 → 360,400,000 → 359,500,000) and common shares outstanding of 355,682,860 as of 2026-06-30. Long-term debt fell from $ 4,948,200,000 (as of 2025-05-31) to $ 4,556,100,000 (as of 2026-05-31).
How this note was made
every stage ran before the note was writtenAnalyst desk
Mercer, Oakes, Nash, Ellis, Yates, Talbot and Archer. The desk: named AI agents, not people. Each reads one slice of the evidence and nothing else — no outside knowledge, no browsing — so every finding traces to a source you can open.
Reads the XBRL figures companies file with the SEC — revenue, margins, income, debt and share count, quarter by quarter — and reports which way the trend is running.
For fiscal Q1 2026 (2025-06-01 to 2025-08-31, 3mo) revenues were $1,540,000,000, cost of revenue was $413,800,000, operating income was $541,900,000, net income was $383,800,000, and diluted EPS was $1.06.
XBRL companyfacts · 0001193125-25-224997For fiscal Q2 2026 (2025-09-01 to 2025-11-30, 3mo) revenues were $1,557,600,000, cost of revenue was $412,200,000, operating income was $571,900,000, net income was $395,400,000, and diluted EPS was $1.10.
XBRL companyfacts · 0001193125-25-328698Reads the filings themselves, above all the year-over-year diff of Item 1A risk factors: which risks a company added, dropped or quietly reworded since its last annual report.
Which filings the desk reads
The desk reads the annual 10-K in full — its risk factors, and how they changed since last year. Quarterly 10-Qs and event filings (8-Ks, insider Form 4s) are listed for context but not read line by line: the 10-K is where the material risk disclosures live. A brand-new company, or one we have only just begun tracking, may have no annual report on file yet — its risk analysis fills in once that lands.
A Form 4 insider transaction filing for PAYX was filed on 2026-08-17.
4 filed 2026-08-17The provided evidence set contains only that Form 4 (the 4 filed 17 August 2026) and does not include an annual report, quarterly 10-Q, current report (8-K), or risk-factor filings, so no risk-factor diff or management discussion text is available in the supplied materials.
4 filed 2026-08-17dropped in debateReads the signal panel above — momentum, volatility, drawdown, relative strength and beta — and ranks each against the whole research universe rather than judging it in isolation.
Six-month momentum is +32.5% and ranks in the 89th percentile of the 547-stock research universe, indicating unusually strong recent price gains as of 2026-09-02.
Moneyta signal set · 2026-09-02Price is above both the 50-day and 200-day simple moving averages (price vs SMA50 +8.0%, price vs SMA200 +21.6%) and a golden cross is present, which are technical signals often associated with recent upward trend alignment as of 2026-09-02.
Moneyta signal set · 2026-09-02Reads which funds hold the name and at what weight, plus insider Form 4 filings, to show the exposure you may already carry through index funds.
As of 2 September 2026, the iShares Core S&P 500 ETF (IVV) held PAYX at 0.05% of the fund.
ETF constituents · market dataA Form 4 filing for the company was submitted with the 4 filed 17 August 2026 and filing date 17 August 2026.
Form 4 × 1 (90d window not enforced here)Reads recent headlines that are genuinely about this company, ignoring rating chatter and market-wide stories. Findings argue in the debate but never move the sentiment score.
Several institutional investors filed new positions in Paychex during the 2nd quarter, with reports citing purchases of 95,156 shares, 90,348 shares, 12,684 shares, and 156,379 shares in separate filings.
News · thelincolnianonline.com · 2026-09-01Paychex published early adopter results for its WISE AI showing reduced payroll errors and improved service efficiency across more than 50,000 businesses, a story carried by at least two distinct outlets.
News · finance.yahoo.com · 2026-08-31Reads parsed Forms 3/4/5 — who bought or sold, at what size, and whether a 10b5-1 plan was involved. Flags clustered open-market officer buying; treats plan sales as routine and never counts a fund or 10%-holder as an officer.
Simmons Christopher C (VP, Controller & Treasurer) reported a disposition of 130 shares valued at "$16k" on 2026-08-14 (action code "F").
Form 4 · Simmons Christopher C (VP, Controller & Treasurer) · $16k code F · 2026-08-14The filing shows no trading plan indicated for this transaction (trading_plan: null).
Form 4 · Simmons Christopher C (VP, Controller & Treasurer) · $16k code F · 2026-08-14Reads the implied-expectations math built from the company's own filings (the growth rate today's price would justify, and the multiples beside it) and argues whether the market's bar looks high or low for this business. Never turns the math into a target.
As of the price date 2026-09-02, the model shows the free cash flow (FCF) that today's price would justify corresponds to an implied FCF growth rate of 9.75% (0.0975).
Valuation inputs · SEC XBRL + stored EOD closePrice-to-free-cash-flow (P/FCF) on a trailing twelve-month basis is 20.63 according to the filing data used in the model.
Valuation inputs · SEC XBRL + stored EOD closeDebate and risk review
A bull and a bear contest the claims and the chair rules on each; the risk review stress-tests what survived.
A bull and a bear argue the analysts' claims across two rounds, then a chair rules on each one. Only what survives feeds the score — the argument is shown, not hidden, so you can judge the reasoning yourself.
Recent quarter results and capital-return metrics collectively signal a favorable operational and shareholder-return profile for PAYX in the provided evidence. Fiscal Q3 2026 shows a noticeable step-up in revenue, operating income, net income, and diluted EPS versus the prior quarters (fundamentals-2), while weighted-average diluted shares and reported shares outstanding have declined across filings (fundamentals-3, fundamentals-4), which mechanically concentrates per-share earnings. Long-term debt fell year-over-year in the 10-K (fundamentals-5), supporting a cleaner leverage picture alongside strong trailing FCF and EBITDA amounts used in valuation metrics (valuation-4) even if multiples are not unusually low (valuation-1, valuation-2, valuation-3). Market signals show strong recent price momentum and bullish moving-average alignment (market-0, market-1), and company-reported product progress (WISE AI early-adopter results) plus institutional purchases and product expansion coverage (news-1, news-2, news-3, news-0) provide corroborating operational and investor-interest evidence. Together these points form a joint case that the company has improving core profitability, ongoing share-reduction, debt reduction, and visible product-driven operational improvements in the supplied materials.
Chair's verdict, claim by claim
Fragility · computed, not argued
balanced0.33
30 surviving claims rest on 15 distinct sources; the heaviest analyst carries 23% of them, and 97% of what the desk raised survived the debate.
The surviving set is moderately concentrated: 30 claims draw on 15 distinct sources and one analyst supplies nearly a quarter of claims, so individual contributor bias or error could disproportionately affect the read. A 97% survival through debate implies internal consistency (few counterclaims were sustained), but that high survival can also reflect group confirmation rather than independent external validation — treat the read as reasonably coherent but somewhat fragile to a small number of source-level reversals.
Peer context · computed, not argued
12-1 momentum ranks 2nd of 2 in Staffing & Employment Services (as of 2026-09-02).
6-month relative strength ranks 1st of 2 in Staffing & Employment Services (as of 2026-09-02).
90-day volatility ranks 2nd of 2 in Staffing & Employment Services (as of 2026-09-02).
dividend yield ranks 1st of 2 in Staffing & Employment Services (as of 2026-09-02).
Disconfirming evidence · base rates · falsifiers
Context
Outside consensus, and where this name already sits in your own portfolio.
Third-party consensus shown for context. It never enters Moneyta sentiment — when the two diverge, the debate above is where the why lives.
What this was built from
Every figure on this page traces to one of these. The desk reads only what is listed here — no outside knowledge, no browsing — and each card shows who read it and what it contributed to the score.
10 filings· 2 cited
SEC XBRL filings
Quarterly figures as filed with the SEC, read straight from EDGAR's structured data — not retyped or estimated.
Read by Mercer+0.7 to the score
1 document
SEC filing documents
The filings themselves, including the year-over-year comparison of Item 1A risk factors.
Read by Oakes+0.0 to the score
1 signal set
Moneyta signal set
Computed from our own end-of-day price history and ranked against the whole research universe. No AI involved.
Read by Nash+0.3 to the score
2 holdings records
Fund holdings
Which funds hold this name and at what weight, plus insider Form 4 filings.
Read by Ellis+0.3 to the score
8 headlines· 2 cited
News coverage
Recent headlines about this company, rating chatter excluded and nothing published after the report date.
Read by Yatesnothing survived
1 filing
Insider filings
Parsed Forms 3/4/5 from EDGAR: named insiders, share counts, prices, and 10b5-1 plan state — stated and inferred flags kept apart.
Read by Talbot+0.0 to the score
1 computation
Valuation inputs
TTM cash-flow figures from the company's own XBRL filings, priced with the stored closing price. Implied growth and multiples only; no fair-value dollar figure reaches the desk, by design.
Read by Archercontext only
1 record· 0 cited
Company profile
Sector, industry and company details.
1 record· 0 cited
Analyst consensus
Third-party consensus, shown for context only — it never enters Moneyta sentiment.
Read means we pulled and handed it to an analyst; cited means a claim on this page points at it. Reading twelve quarters to state one trend is normal — the gap is shown rather than hidden.
Written by AI, checked against sources
The analysts, the bull–bear debate and the editor's note are AI agents reading only the evidence listed on this page. They can misread a filing or a headline, which is why every claim cites a source you can open and check yourself. The sentiment score is arithmetic over the claims that survived the debate, not a language model's opinion.
Educational analysis of published data. Moneyta does not give investment advice or make recommendations. Past patterns do not indicate future results.
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The full terminal on PAYX Gold
Who holds it, who's buying, what the Street thinks: live behind the lock, updated as filings land.
Institutional holders
Net institutional flow, Q/Q
Largest holder position
Insider buys, 90 days
Clustered insider value
Street target range
The real figures are for members. Educational analysis, not advice.
Educational analysis of published data. Moneyta does not give investment advice or make recommendations.