Automatic Data Processing share price today

Automatic Data Processing, Inc.'s share price was $303.65 at the close on 4 November 2026. It has been stalling near its high for 19 weeks. That is 26.0% above its average price over the last 200 trading days.

A share price tends to move through four phases: moving sideways (stage 1), rising (stage 2), stalling near a high (stage 3) and falling (stage 4). Today Automatic Data Processing, Inc. is in stage 3. The phase helps read everything below.

In the last 52 weeks it traded between $189 and $304, and at that close it was at the high of that range. Over the past 13 weeks it has done better than the S&P 500, and it has stayed ahead for 19 weeks in a row.

Over the last 10 years the share price moved +221% while the S&P 500 moved +261%, so it is behind the index over that whole period. The chart above shows the 13-week comparison for every week.

This page treats a rise as over when the price closes below its 200-day average on two Fridays in a row.

Automatic Data Processing, Inc. paid $6.80 per share over the last four reported quarters. The most recent declaration was $1.70 for Sep 2026. At today's price of $303.65 that is a yield of 2.24%, based on dividends already paid, not a forecast.

A dividend is cash paid out for each share. The 12-month total is the four most recent quarters added together.

Automatic Data Processing is on 3 of our US lists: Nasdaq 100 companies, S&P 500 companies and US tech stocks.

Automatic Data Processing, Inc. earned $1.1 B of net profit in the Sep 2026 quarter, +11.1% on the same quarter a year earlier. That is the 12th quarter in a row of profit growth. Full-year FY26 profit was $4.4 B. Over 5 years profit has grown 11.2% a year on average. That is 20.5% of the quarter's revenue.

Net profit is what is left after every cost, interest and tax. Earnings per share, dividends and book value all grow from it.

The same quarter a year earlier earned $1.0 B.

For the full year, FY26 profit was $4.4 B (+8.2% on the year before).

Why profit moved: revenue changed +6.1% on a year earlier and the margin moved +0.8 percentage points. Sales did the work, and the margin was about flat.

On average over the last four quarters, profit changed +9.4% and revenue +6.5%. Profit and revenue are moving at about the same pace.

Automatic Data Processing, Inc. reported $5.5 B of revenue in the Sep 2026 quarter, +6.1% on the same quarter a year earlier. That is the 12th quarter in a row with growth on the year before. Over 5 years it has grown 7.9% a year on average. The last full year, FY26, came in at $21.9 B.

Revenue is everything the company billed its customers in the period.

The last four reported quarters add to $22.3 B.

FY26 revenue was $21.9 B, +6.7% on the year before.

Recent pace: the last four quarters grew +6.5% on average, against 7.9% a year over the longer run, so this year is growing slower than its own long-run rate.

Is growth speeding up? Revenue over the last 12 months grew +6.5%, against +6.8% a year over the last 8 quarters (stabilising); profit over the last 12 months grew +9.4%, against +8.4% a year (stabilising).

Automatic Data Processing, Inc.'s operating margin was 26.7% in the Sep 2026 quarter, 0.8 percentage points higher than the same quarter a year ago. Its latest full-year margin is the highest it has ever reported. Across 6 years it has been between 22.2% and 26.5%. The latest quarter is above every full year in that period.

Operating margin is what is left from every $100 of sales after the costs of running the business, before interest and tax. It shows pricing power and cost control.

Why the margin moved: operating margin changed +0.8 percentage points on the year while gross margin changed +0.7 points. So the gain came mostly from the gross margin, which means input costs and prices charged.

As noted under valuation: when margins are at a record, every ratio built on profit looks better than usual, so a low multiple can mislead.

Over the last 3 years, 119% of Automatic Data Processing, Inc.'s reported profit came in as cash from its operations, so the profit is backed by cash. In FY26 it brought in $5.4 B of operating cash against $4.4 B of profit. After $197 M of spending on assets, $5.2 B was left over as free cash.

The profit and loss account shows what was earned. The cash-flow statement shows the cash that actually came in. Comparing operating cash flow with profit is one of the best checks that a profit is real.

Cash-flow figures here are yearly, because quarterly cash statements are not published, so this section changes once a year.

Why: the cash figure is clear, but the day counts behind it are not in our data, so we show it without guessing the reason.

What to look at next: the main use of cash is spending on assets. The next section checks what that spending is building.

Automatic Data Processing, Inc. does not report the customer, stock and supplier day counts a cash cycle needs, so this section looks at its spending on assets instead. It spent $574 M on assets over the last 3 years. Averaged over those years that is 0.9% of FY26 revenue a year.

Working capital is the cash tied up between paying suppliers and getting paid. Debtor days: how long customers take to pay. Inventory days: how long stock sits. The cash cycle: the whole loop, in days of sales.

Nothing is estimated in place of the missing day counts, so no cash-cycle chart is drawn.

Spending on assets: $574 M over the last 3 years.

In short: the cash is going into new capacity, not getting stuck in the daily cycle. The question is whether the new capacity earns.

Automatic Data Processing, Inc.'s P/E is 26.9×, near the low end of its own history: it has been lower only 24% of the time. Its usual P/E (the middle reading) is 29.2×, over 4.6 years of weekly prices. This compares the share price with the company’s own past. It does not say what the business is worth.

P/E is the share price divided by a year's profit per share: how many dollars the market pays for each dollar of yearly profit.

Keep one thing in mind: margins are the best this company has ever reported. A multiple that looks low against its own past can mislead when profit is at a record. If margins fall back, today's multiple is higher than it looks.

Why the multiple is where it is: over the past year earnings per share moved +9.6% while the price moved +19.5%. The price did better than earnings, which pushed the multiple up within its own range.

Where the price move came from: over 3 years the price moved +11.5% a year; about +10.2% a year came from earnings growth and about +1.3 percentage points from the multiple (the market paying more). The split is approximate (price return minus earnings growth). It shows how much of the move came from the market paying a different multiple.

In short: the multiple is low against its own past, so the earnings trend underneath matters more than the multiple.

Automatic Data Processing, Inc.'s business is growing steadily. Revenue, profit and EPS growth have stayed positive throughout, and ROCE is steady at 48.6%. This is based on 12 quarters of 4 measures.

Every business is somewhere on a path of getting better or worse, and this section names where. The last 12 quarters of growth in revenue, profit and earnings per share, plus the return the business earns on its capital, are read as lines. Getting worse: the lines are falling. Turning around: a low point has just formed and the last few quarters are rising from it. Getting better: the rise from the low has lasted. Growing steadily: steady growth with healthy returns. Slowing from a peak: still high, but slowing. When the lines disagree the result is mixed; too little history means no reading. CAGR (compound annual growth rate) is the steady yearly rate that would turn the starting value into the latest one. It is the fairest way to compare growth over different periods. If the 1-year figure is much bigger than the 10-year one, recent growth is running faster than the long-run trend. A dash means there is no figure for that period, or the starting year was a loss, where a growth rate means nothing.