Yahoo Finance American Express (AXP) Gains But Lags Market: What You Should Know
American Express (AXP) closed the most recent trading day at $102.69, moving +0.02% from the previous trading session. This move lagged the S&P 500's daily gain of 0.86%. Elsewhere, the Dow lost 0.06%, while the tech-heavy Nasdaq added 1.37%.
Prior to today's trading, shares of the credit card issuer and global payments company had gained 7.31% over the past month. This has lagged the Finance sector's gain of 9.7% and the S&P 500's gain of 8.11% in that time.
Investors will be hoping for strength from AXP as it approaches its next earnings release, which is expected to be April 17, 2019. In that report, analysts expect AXP to post earnings of $2.02 per share. This would mark year-over-year growth of 8.6%. Our most recent consensus estimate is calling for quarterly revenue of $10.50 billion, up 8% from the year-ago period.
AXP's full-year Zacks Consensus Estimates are calling for earnings of $8.13 per share and revenue of $43.63 billion. These results would represent year-over-year changes of +10.91% and +8.16%, respectively.
It is also important to note the recent changes to analyst estimates for AXP. Recent revisions tend to reflect the latest near-term business trends. With this in mind, we can consider positive estimate revisions a sign of optimism about the company's business outlook.
Our research shows that these estimate changes are directly correlated with near-term stock prices. Investors can capitalize on this by using the Zacks Rank. This model considers these estimate changes and provides a simple, actionable rating system.
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. Within the past 30 days, our consensus EPS projection has moved 0.78% lower. AXP currently has a Zacks Rank of #3 (Hold).
Valuation is also important, so investors should note that AXP has a Forward P/E ratio of 12.63 right now. Its industry sports an average Forward P/E of 11.58, so we one might conclude that AXP is trading at a premium comparatively.
Also, we should mention that AXP has a PEG ratio of 1.2. This metric is used similarly to the famous P/E ratio, but the PEG ratio also takes into account the stock's expected earnings growth rate. The Financial - Miscellaneous Services was holding an average PEG ratio of 1.2 at yesterday's closing price.
The Financial - Miscellaneous Services industry is part of the Finance sector. This group has a Zacks Industry Rank of 187, putting it in the bottom 27% of all 250+ industries.
The Zacks Industry Rank gauges the strength of our 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.
Make sure to utilize Zacks. Com to follow all of these stock-moving metrics, and more, in the coming trading sessions.
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