In the latest trading session, Lowe's (LOW) closed at $101.51, marking a +0.05% move from the previous day. The stock outpaced the S&P 500's daily loss of 0.27%. At the same time, the Dow lost 0.41%, and the tech-heavy Nasdaq gained 0.09%.
Prior to today's trading, shares of the home improvement retailer had gained 7.98% over the past month. This has outpaced the Retail-Wholesale sector's gain of 4.47% and the S&P 500's gain of 6.26% in that time.
Wall Street will be looking for positivity from LOW as it approaches its next earnings report date. This is expected to be February 27, 2019. On that day, LOW is projected to report earnings of $0.80 per share, which would represent year-over-year growth of 8.11%. Our most recent consensus estimate is calling for quarterly revenue of $15.72 billion, up 1.46% from the year-ago period.
Investors should also note any recent changes to analyst estimates for LOW. These revisions typically reflect the latest short-term business trends, which can change frequently. As a result, we can interpret positive estimate revisions as a good sign for the company's business outlook.
Research indicates that these estimate revisions are directly correlated with near-term share price momentum. We developed the Zacks Rank to capitalize on this phenomenon. Our system takes these estimate changes into account and delivers a clear, actionable rating model.
Ranging from #1 (Strong Buy) to #5 (Strong Sell), the Zacks Rank system has a proven, outside-audited track record of outperformance, with #1 stocks returning an average of +25% annually since 1988. Over the past month, the Zacks Consensus EPS estimate has moved 0.06% lower. LOW is currently sporting a Zacks Rank of #3 (Hold).
Looking at its valuation, LOW is holding a Forward P/E ratio of 16.76. For comparison, its industry has an average Forward P/E of 11.49, which means LOW is trading at a premium to the group.
Meanwhile, LOW's PEG ratio is currently 1.19. The PEG ratio is similar to the widely-used P/E ratio, but this metric also takes the company's expected earnings growth rate into account. LOW's industry had an average PEG ratio of 1.12 as of yesterday's close.
The Building Products - Retail industry is part of the Retail-Wholesale sector. This industry currently has a Zacks Industry Rank of 170, which puts it in the bottom 34% of all 250+ industries.
The Zacks Industry Rank gauges the strength of our individual industry groups by measuring the average Zacks Rank of the individual stocks within the groups. Our research shows that the top 50% rated industries outperform the bottom half by a factor of 2 to 1.
Be sure to follow all of these stock-moving metrics, and many more, on Zacks.com.
Lowe's Companies, Inc. (NYSE:LOW): Free Stock Analysis Report
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