What Happened?

Shares of equipment rental company United Rentals (NYSE:URI) jumped 10.3% in the afternoon session after the company reported strong first-quarter 2025 results which beat analysts' expectations across revenue, EPS, and EBITDA, pointing to resilient equipment demand and disciplined execution despite margin pressures. Sales rose close to 7%, but higher costs and a shift in business mix led to a dip in profit margins. Still, they managed to grow EBITDA and cash flow thanks to tight cost control and a tax gain from a scrapped deal. Overall, this quarter had some key positives.

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What The Market Is Telling Us

United Rentals’s shares are somewhat volatile and have had 14 moves greater than 5% over the last year. But moves this big are rare even for United Rentals and indicate this news significantly impacted the market’s perception of the business.

The biggest move we wrote about over the last year was 6 months ago when the stock gained 11.4% on the news that stocks rallied as Republican party candidate Donald Trump was declared the winner of the 2024 US presidential election. For industrial stocks, President-elect Trump was considered more pro-business and a defender of American industrial interests. This could generally lead to a more robust capital expenditures and investment environment.

United Rentals is down 6.4% since the beginning of the year, and at $645.54 per share, it is trading 26.7% below its 52-week high of $880.32 from November 2024. Investors who bought $1,000 worth of United Rentals’s shares 5 years ago would now be looking at an investment worth $6,087.

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