Darden Restaurants (DRI) Stock Sinks As Market Gains: What You Should Know

Darden Restaurants (DRI) closed the most recent trading day at $110.95, moving -1.09% from the previous trading session. This move lagged the S&P 500's daily gain of 0.37%. Elsewhere, the Dow gained 0.42%, while the tech-heavy Nasdaq added 0.56%.

Heading into today, shares of the owner of Olive Garden and other chain restaurants had lost 2.75% over the past month, lagging the Retail-Wholesale sector's gain of 2.79% and the S&P 500's gain of 4.42% in that time.

Investors will be hoping for strength from DRI as it approaches its next earnings release. On that day, DRI is projected to report earnings of $1.07 per share, which would represent year-over-year growth of 16.3%. Meanwhile, our latest consensus estimate is calling for revenue of $2.06 billion, up 4.29% from the prior-year quarter.

Looking at the full year, our Zacks Consensus Estimates suggest analysts are expecting earnings of $6.38 per share and revenue of $9.03 billion. These totals would mark changes of +9.62% and +6.08%, respectively, from last year.

Any recent changes to analyst estimates for DRI should also be noted by investors. These revisions typically reflect the latest short-term business trends, which can change frequently. With this in mind, we can consider positive estimate revisions a sign of optimism about the company's business outlook.

Based on our research, we believe these estimate revisions are directly related to near-team stock moves. 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.

The Zacks Rank system, which ranges from #1 (Strong Buy) to #5 (Strong Sell), has an impressive outside-audited track record of outperformance, with #1 stocks generating an average annual return of +25% since 1988. The Zacks Consensus EPS estimate remained stagnant within the past month. DRI currently has a Zacks Rank of #3 (Hold).

In terms of valuation, DRI is currently trading at a Forward P/E ratio of 17.58. This represents a discount compared to its industry's average Forward P/E of 23.05.

We can also see that DRI currently has a PEG ratio of 1.98. This popular metric is similar to the widely-known P/E ratio, with the difference being that the PEG ratio also takes into account the company's expected earnings growth rate. Retail - Restaurants stocks are, on average, holding a PEG ratio of 2.16 based on yesterday's closing prices.

The Retail - Restaurants industry is part of the Retail-Wholesale sector. This group has a Zacks Industry Rank of 138, putting it in the bottom 46% 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.

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