Yahoo Finance Cigna (CI) Outpaces Stock Market Gains: What You Should Know
Cigna (CI) closed at $259.68 in the latest trading session, marking a +1.48% move from the prior day. The stock outpaced the S&P 500's daily gain of 0.95%. Elsewhere, the Dow gained 0.64%, while the tech-heavy Nasdaq added 0.15%.
Heading into today, shares of the health insurer had lost 3.71% over the past month, outpacing the Finance sector's loss of 4.55% and lagging the S&P 500's loss of 3.49% in that time.
Investors will be hoping for strength from Cigna as it approaches its next earnings release, which is expected to be August 4, 2022. On that day, Cigna is projected to report earnings of $5.44 per share, which would represent year-over-year growth of 3.82%. Our most recent consensus estimate is calling for quarterly revenue of $44.23 billion, up 2.6% from the year-ago period.
For the full year, our Zacks Consensus Estimates are projecting earnings of $22.68 per share and revenue of $177.75 billion, which would represent changes of +10.8% and +2.11%, respectively, from the prior year.
Investors might also notice recent changes to analyst estimates for Cigna. 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.
Our research shows that these estimate changes are directly correlated with near-term stock prices. To benefit from this, we have developed the Zacks Rank, a proprietary model which takes these estimate changes into account and provides an 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. Within the past 30 days, our consensus EPS projection has moved 0.23% higher. Cigna currently has a Zacks Rank of #3 (Hold).
Investors should also note Cigna's current valuation metrics, including its Forward P/E ratio of 11.28. For comparison, its industry has an average Forward P/E of 9.24, which means Cigna is trading at a premium to the group.
We can also see that CI currently has a PEG ratio of 1.02. 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 Insurance - Multi line was holding an average PEG ratio of 1.06 at yesterday's closing price.
The Insurance - Multi line industry is part of the Finance sector. This industry currently has a Zacks Industry Rank of 182, which puts it in the bottom 29% 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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