Yahoo Finance Air Products and Chemicals (APD) Outpaces Stock Market Gains: What You Should Know
Air Products and Chemicals (APD) closed at $279.72 in the latest trading session, marking a +1.23% move from the prior day. This move outpaced the S&P 500's daily gain of 0.57%. Elsewhere, the Dow gained 0.43%, while the tech-heavy Nasdaq added 0.33%.
Heading into today, shares of the seller of gases for industrial, medical and other uses had lost 4.15% over the past month, lagging the Basic Materials sector's loss of 0.51% and the S&P 500's gain of 1.72% in that time.
Air Products and Chemicals will be looking to display strength as it nears its next earnings release. On that day, Air Products and Chemicals is projected to report earnings of $2.63 per share, which would represent year-over-year growth of 10.5%. Meanwhile, the Zacks Consensus Estimate for revenue is projecting net sales of $3.02 billion, up 2.67% from the year-ago period.
For the full year, our Zacks Consensus Estimates are projecting earnings of $11.39 per share and revenue of $13.12 billion, which would represent changes of +9.41% and +3.32%, respectively, from the prior year.
Investors might also notice recent changes to analyst estimates for Air Products and Chemicals. These revisions help to show the ever-changing nature of near-term business trends. As such, positive estimate revisions reflect analyst optimism about the company's business and profitability.
Based on our research, we believe these estimate revisions are directly related to near-team stock moves. Investors can capitalize on this by using the Zacks Rank. This model considers these estimate changes and provides a simple, actionable rating system.
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. Over the past month, the Zacks Consensus EPS estimate remained stagnant. Air Products and Chemicals is currently a Zacks Rank #3 (Hold).
In terms of valuation, Air Products and Chemicals is currently trading at a Forward P/E ratio of 24.27. This valuation marks a premium compared to its industry's average Forward P/E of 13.4.
Investors should also note that APD has a PEG ratio of 2.08 right now. 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. The Chemical - Diversified was holding an average PEG ratio of 2.13 at yesterday's closing price.
The Chemical - Diversified industry is part of the Basic Materials sector. This group has a Zacks Industry Rank of 191, putting it in the bottom 25% 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.
You can find more information on all of these metrics, and much more, on Zacks.com.
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Air Products and Chemicals, Inc. (APD) : Free Stock Analysis Report
