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Goldman Sachs analyst Michael Ng has started coverage on Fintech firms PayPal (NASDAQ:PYPL) and Block (NYSE:SQ) with respective Buy ratings, according to a note written to clients Wednesday.
PYPL stock is edging higher by 0.8% in premarket trading, and SQ shares tick up 0.2%.
The analyst is expecting PayPal (PYPL) to return to EPS growth in excess of 20% beyond this year, driven by product initiatives and secular tailwinds from the digitization of payments. For 2022, analysts estimated PYPL's EPS to grow 1.03% Y/Y to $4.65, and expand to $5.83 in 2023.
Total payment volume growth "should benefit from the continued digitization of payments and ecommerce growth as well as international expansion," Ng highlighted.
For Block (SQ), the company is "well positioned to benefit from Cash App’s growing monetization from new product features (e.g., tax preparation, card spending, cash management, stock investing, Bitcoin) while enjoying ongoing user growth from the network effects of P2P payments," the analyst said.
Also, the company's acquisition of Buy Now, Pay Later platform Afterpay (OTCPK:AFTPF) (OTCPK:AFTPY) should "integrate the Square and Cash App ecosystems through the addition of new consumers and merchants, as well as helping to establish commerce & brand discovery features into Cash App while generating leads for merchant," Ng added.
Meanwhile, Seeking Alpha's Quant Rating screens SQ stock with a Hold rating and PYPL at Sell. Both stocks are down double-digit percentage points on a YTD basis.
In the beginning of March, PayPal got downgraded to Neutral at BofA.