Cognizant (CTSH)
Forward P/E is 10.95x against a peer median of 16.43x, a ratio of 0.67x — the deepest discount in this batch — with a trailing P/E of 14.3x. Latest-quarter revenue growth was +5.8% year over year (PRIMARY/EDGAR), slightly ahead of the cluster median of +5.2%, so growth is slow but not collapsing and not worse than its peers. The PEG ratio of 1.42 shows the market is pricing in only modest earnings growth, yet the one-third discount to peers is wider than that slow growth explains. Delivered demand check: the cluster's median revenue growth was +5.2% year over year — demand steady.
What would change this label: Move to FAIRLY PRICED if the forward P/E rises above about 14.8x (0.90x the current peer median of 16.43x), or if revenue growth falls below 0% year over year for the latest quarter. The UNDERVALUED label strengthens if revenue growth accelerates above +10% year over year while the forward P/E stays at or below 10.95x.
Cognizant helps big companies run and modernise their computer systems. It is growing slowly — sales up about 6% on a year ago, about the same as its rivals — but its shares cost only about 11 times expected profits versus about 16 times for those rivals. Slow growth explains part of that gap, but not all of it, so the shares look cheap on these numbers.
Both lines start at 100 on 2020-09-01. Over the full window Cognizant returned -1.12% and the S&P 500 +118.28% (price returns; dividends not reinvested). Worst peak-to-trough fall for Cognizant: -58.4% (2022-03-22 to 2026-06-30). Source: Nasdaq official daily history.
What the label rests on
Forward P/E is 10.95x against a peer median of 16.43x, a ratio of 0.67x — the deepest discount in this batch — with a trailing P/E of 14.3x. Latest-quarter revenue growth was +5.8% year over year (PRIMARY/EDGAR), slightly ahead of the cluster median of +5.2%, so growth is slow but not collapsing and not worse than its peers. The PEG ratio of 1.42 shows the market is pricing in only modest earnings growth, yet the one-third discount to peers is wider than that slow growth explains. Delivered demand check: the cluster's median revenue growth was +5.2% year over year — demand steady. The company’s forward P/E is 10.9× against a peer median of 16.4×. Its own history: UNVERIFIED — no sourced range available. Sector demand read: Delivered demand check: the IT consulting & services group's median latest-quarter revenue growth was +5.2% year over year (SEC filings) — demand steady. Latest-quarter sales growth was +5.8% versus a year earlier (SEC filings).
| Company | Price (Oct 28, 2026) | Forward P/E | Trailing P/E |
|---|---|---|---|
| Cognizant (CTSH) | $66.38 | 10.9× | 14.3× |
| IT | $218.13 | 14.2× | 19.9× |
| ACN | $241.19 | 16.4× | 17.8× |
| IBM | $251.00 | 19.2× | 21.4× |
| Peer median | 16.4× |
Multiples: stockanalysis.com (SECONDARY, S&P Global data), fetched Oct 28, 2026. Peer set chosen by sector; the median is the middle value of the set. The label and its numbers were recorded in the programme’s label registry on Oct 28, 2026 and will be scored at 6 and 12 months.
Sales, profit and cash
This company does not report a gross-profit line in its SEC facts (normal for banks, payment networks and some health insurers), so profit is shown as net income instead — gross margin is marked UNVERIFIED-absent rather than estimated.
Free cash flow = cash from operations minus spending on plant and equipment, both from the company’s SEC cash-flow statement. Gaps are quarters where that spending line is not separately tagged in the filings — shown as gaps, never estimated.
| Quarter | Sales | Gross margin | Net income | EPS (GAAP, diluted) | Free cash flow |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Q/E Mar 2026 2026-03-31 | $5.4B | — | $662M | 1.39 | $198M |
| Q/E Dec 2025 2025-12-31 | $5.3B | — | $648M | — | $781M |
| Q/E Sep 2025 2025-09-30 | $5.4B | — | $274M | 0.56 | $1.2B |
| Q/E Jun 2025 2025-06-30 | $5.2B | — | $645M | 1.31 | $331M |
| Q/E Mar 2025 2025-03-31 | $5.1B | — | $663M | 1.34 | $323M |
| Q/E Dec 2024 2024-12-31 | $5.1B | — | $546M | — | $837M |
| Q/E Sep 2024 2024-09-30 | $5.0B | — | $582M | 1.17 | $791M |
| Q/E Jun 2024 2024-06-30 | $4.8B | — | $566M | 1.14 | $183M |
| Q/E Mar 2024 2024-03-31 | $4.8B | — | $546M | 1.10 | $16M |
| Q/E Dec 2023 2023-12-31 | $4.8B | — | $558M | — | $659M |
| Q/E Sep 2023 2023-09-30 | $4.9B | — | $525M | 1.04 | $755M |
| Q/E Jun 2023 2023-06-30 | $4.9B | — | $463M | 0.91 | $-32M |
The last twelve reported quarters. Full 23-quarter history sits in the data pack behind this page. A dash means the figure is not tagged as a standalone quarter in the company’s SEC facts (the usual case is the fourth quarter, which many companies only report inside the full-year filing) — it is missing, not zero.
Earnings: getting better or worse?
Each box is one quarter’s earnings per share (EPS). Green means EPS was higher than the same quarter a year earlier; red means lower; a dash means the figure is not tagged in the filings.
Basis: GAAP diluted EPS from SEC company facts, compared with the same quarter a year earlier.
Key facts
| Item | Value |
|---|---|
| Company (legal name in filings) | COGNIZANT TECHNOLOGY SOLUTIONS CORP |
| Chief executive | Ravi Kumar Singisetti (source: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cognizant) |
| Sector | Technology — IT Consulting & Other Services — sells IT consulting, outsourcing and digital services to large companies |
| Share price (Oct 28, 2026) | $66.38 |
| Market value (market cap) | $31.4B — share price times shares outstanding of 473,869,469 (SEC filings; SEC EDGAR dei EntityCommonStockSharesOutstanding (latest)) |
| Sales, last twelve months | $21.4B |
| Net income, last twelve months | $2.2B |
| Free cash flow, last twelve months | $2.5B |
| Latest reported quarter | Q/E Mar 2026 (of 23 quarters in the data pack) |
| Six-year price return vs S&P 500 | -1.12% vs +118.28% |
| Worst peak-to-trough fall | -58.4% (2022-03-22 to 2026-06-30) |
What we could not verify
- Gross profit / gross margin: not tagged as a standalone line in this company's EDGAR company facts (common for banks, payment networks and some healthcare payers) — shown as UNVERIFIED-absent; the page charts revenue and net income instead.
- TTM GAAP diluted EPS could not be summed from company facts because at least one of the last four quarters (typically Q4) has no standalone tagged EPS; trailing P/E is therefore taken from the labelled secondary source in valuation_label.md.
- Own-history P/E range not yet compiled for this company in the Phase 1 batch run; the label rests on peer-median, growth and PEG evidence.
- Peer set in the brief contains only three peers (IT, ACN, IBM), so the peer median of 16.43x rests on a small peer set.
- Guidance record (each quarter scored against the guidance the company gave the quarter before) is not yet compiled for this company — it is a Phase 2 layer. The earnings strip below therefore uses reported EPS versus a year earlier, which is fully sourced from filings.
The IT factor — the most exciting thing the market is overlooking — is not assessed on an X-Ray page. It belongs to the Deep Dive (Phase 2), where it gets the evidence standard it needs. Leadership-era scoring (the six years split by chief executive) is likewise a Phase 2 layer; this page names the current chief executive only, from a sourced profile.
Sources
- SEC EDGAR submissions — Filing index; company legal name.
https://data.sec.gov/submissions/CIK0001058290.json - SEC EDGAR company facts — Quarterly financial spine: revenue, gross profit, net income, GAAP diluted EPS, operating cash flow, PP&E capex, buybacks, dividends, diluted shares.
https://data.sec.gov/api/xbrl/companyfacts/CIK0001058290.json - Nasdaq official daily history — Daily closes for the company; SPY (assetclass=etf) saved as raw/nasdaq_spy_raw.json over identical dates.
https://api.nasdaq.com/api/quote/CTSH/historical?assetclass=stocks - Valuation multiples and peer figures — stockanalysis.com (SECONDARY, S&P Global data), fetched Oct 28, 2026; see valuation_label.md in the data pack.
Conventions: earliest-filed value per period, as first reported; cash-flow years-to-date differenced quarter by quarter; EPS never differenced; free cash flow = operating cash flow minus plant-and-equipment spending. This page is a dated snapshot — updates are new versions, never silent edits.