Chicago, IL – February 13, 2026 – Zacks Equity Research shares Proto Labs PRLB, as the Bull of the Day and PayPal PYPL as the Bear of the Day. In addition, Zacks Equity Research provides analysis on —Amazon AMZN, Meta META and Alphabet GOOGL.
Here is a synopsis of all three stocks:
The market has been flirting with highs again. When that happens, investors tend to chase whatever’s moving. But that’s not how you win long term. When volatility creeps back in, and it always does, you want stocks with real earnings momentum underneath the hood. The last couple of weeks, the market has begun to show signs of volatility, so it’s really a great time to laser in your focus on names with strong earnings momentum.
Strong earnings momentum like today’s Bull of the Day, Proto Labs. Proto Labs is a digital manufacturing company specializing in rapid prototyping and low-volume production. Through CNC machining, injection molding, sheet metal fabrication, and industrial 3D printing, they help engineers go from design to production faster than traditional manufacturers. In a world obsessed with supply chain resilience and speed to market, that’s not a bad place to be.
Over the last week, a couple of analysts have really upped the ante on the current year numbers. It’s taken our Zacks Consensus Estimate up from $1.59 to $1.80 for the current year. Next year’s number is at $1.94. That means we are forecasting 8.43% earnings growth this year and 8.06% next year. That’s on revenue growth of 5.95% this year and 5.98% next year.
Manufacturing is quietly undergoing a digital transformation. Companies want shorter lead times, more customization, and less inventory risk. Proto Labs sits right at that intersection. This isn’t a flashy AI darling. It’s not a meme stock. It’s an infrastructure play on modern manufacturing.
Proto Labs, Inc. price-consensus-chart | Proto Labs, Inc. Quote
Technically speaking, the stock has been building a base after prior declines. When you combine improving technical structure with rising earnings estimates, that’s often when institutional money starts to lean in.
The stock is really moving in the right direction as these earnings estimates have gone the same way. A consistent track record of earnings beats is underlying the move higher as well. The company has not missed earnings expectations since late 2021.
After reporting a mixed quarter last week, PayPal not only cratered 20% but shares fell into the cellar of the Zacks Rank as most analysts lowered full year 2026 and 2027 EPS estimates.
This year’s Zacks EPS consensus dropped from $5.83 to $5.38, representing projected growth of only 1.3%. And next year was clipped 11% from $6.64 to $5.91 in the past two months.
And this week, the analyst continue to condemn to the business with Truist Securities maintaining a “Sell” rating and slashing their price target from $58 to $39.
Paypal reported $8.68 billion in revenue for the quarter ended December 2025, representing a year-over-year increase of 3.7%. But EPS of only $1.23 for the same period barely limped over the $1.19 post a year ago.
The reported revenue represents a surprise of -1.07% over the Zacks Consensus Estimate of $8.77 billion. With the consensus EPS estimate being $1.29, the EPS surprise was -4.36%.
This article explains more about the company’s business…
PayPal Reports Q4: What Key Metrics Have to Say
TPV was $475.14 billion for the fourth quarter, up 8.5% year over year on a reported basis and 6% on a forex-neutral basis.
The transaction margin in dollar terms was $4.03 billion, which grew 2.5% on a reported basis. Excluding interest on customer balances, transaction margin dollars increased 3.8% to $3.74 billion.
Transaction revenues were $7.82 billion (90.1% of net revenues), up 3% year over year. Value Added Services revenues were $857 million (9.9% of net revenues), which rose 10.2% year over year.
Net revenues from the United States totaled $4.94 billion (57% of net revenues), up 4.5% on a year-over-year basis. International net revenues were $3.73 billion (43% of net revenues), up 2.7% year over year on a reported basis and 1% on a forex-neutral basis.
PayPal witnessed year-over-year growth of 1.2% in total active accounts to 439 million in the reported quarter. The total number of payment transactions was 6.75 billion, up 2% on a year-over-year basis. However, PYPL’s payment transactions per active account were 57.7, which dropped 4.8% year over year.
Bottom line: As banks become more agile and mobile with services, there’s been lots of disruption in the fintech space for an early pioneer like PayPal, to say nothing of all the new competition. According to analysts, expect that trend to continue.
The Tech sector’s 2025 Q4 earnings results have been very good. But what accounts for the group’s stock market underperformance in recent days can broadly be connected to two factors. At one level is the resumption of the market’s unease with the ever-rising capex budgets from the Mag 7 group.
This isn’t a new issue and has been with us for some time, but this reemerged as a headwind for the group after bigger-than-expected capex announcements from Amazon, Meta and Alphabet on their respective Q4 earnings calls.
The other issue is tied uncertainty around the legacy software business in the coming AI world, with many investors fearing that these software operators may not be as profitable going forward as they have been in the past.
With respect to actual earnings, both results for 2025 Q4 and outlook for the current and coming quarters, the Tech sector remains well positioned. The group has been a key growth driver over the last few years and it continues to play that role in the 2025 Q4 earnings season and is expected to remain a leader in the coming periods as well.
In terms of the Q4 earnings season scorecard, we now have results from 358 S&P 500 members or 71.6% of the index’s total membership. Total earnings for these companies are up +13% from the same period last year on +8.9% higher revenues, with 75.7% beating EPS estimates and 72.1% beating revenue estimates.
To learn more about the Q4 earnings season and evolving expectations for the coming periods, please check out our weekly Earnings Trends report >>>Analyzing the Evolving Earnings Picture: What Should Investors Know?
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Amazon.com, Inc. (AMZN) : Free Stock Analysis Report
Proto Labs, Inc. (PRLB) : Free Stock Analysis Report
Alphabet Inc. (GOOGL) : Free Stock Analysis Report
PayPal Holdings, Inc. (PYPL) : Free Stock Analysis Report
Meta Platforms, Inc. (META) : Free Stock Analysis Report
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