Schlumberger (SLB) Gains As Market Dips: What You Should Know

Schlumberger (SLB) closed the most recent trading day at $43.04, moving +1.7% from the previous trading session. This change outpaced the S&P 500's 2.33% loss on the day. Meanwhile, the Dow lost 2.24%, and the Nasdaq, a tech-heavy index, lost 3.05%.

Heading into today, shares of the world's largest oilfield services company had lost 17.95% over the past month, lagging the Oils-Energy sector's loss of 7.26% and the S&P 500's loss of 1.93% in that time.

Investors will be hoping for strength from SLB as it approaches its next earnings release, which is expected to be January 18, 2019. On that day, SLB is projected to report earnings of $0.41 per share, which would represent a year-over-year decline of 14.58%. Our most recent consensus estimate is calling for quarterly revenue of $8.34 billion, up 1.97% from the year-ago period.

SLB's full-year Zacks Consensus Estimates are calling for earnings of $1.67 per share and revenue of $32.99 billion. These results would represent year-over-year changes of +11.33% and +8.36%, respectively.

Any recent changes to analyst estimates for SLB should also be noted by investors. These revisions typically reflect the latest short-term business trends, which can change frequently. As such, positive estimate revisions reflect analyst optimism about the company's business and profitability.

Research indicates that these estimate revisions are directly correlated with near-term share price momentum. 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. Over the past month, the Zacks Consensus EPS estimate has moved 0.96% lower. SLB is currently sporting a Zacks Rank of #3 (Hold).

Looking at its valuation, SLB is holding a Forward P/E ratio of 25.28. Its industry sports an average Forward P/E of 17.71, so we one might conclude that SLB is trading at a premium comparatively.

Meanwhile, SLB's PEG ratio is currently 4.21. 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. SLB's industry had an average PEG ratio of 2.19 as of yesterday's close.

The Oil and Gas - Field Services industry is part of the Oils-Energy sector. This group has a Zacks Industry Rank of 162, putting it in the bottom 37% 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.

Be sure to follow all of these stock-moving metrics, and many more, on Zacks.com.

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