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Fastenal (FAST) Stock Sinks As Market Gains: What You Should Know

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In the latest trading session, Fastenal (FAST - Free Report) closed at $47.88, marking a -1.36% move from the previous day. This change lagged the S&P 500's daily gain of 1%. Meanwhile, the Dow gained 1.35%, and the Nasdaq, a tech-heavy index, added 0.6%.

Heading into today, shares of the maker of industrial and construction fasteners had gained 6.05% over the past month, outpacing the Retail-Wholesale sector's gain of 5.92% and the S&P 500's gain of 4.48% in that time.

Investors will be hoping for strength from FAST as it approaches its next earnings release. The company is expected to report EPS of $0.37, unchanged from the prior-year quarter. Meanwhile, our latest consensus estimate is calling for revenue of $1.40 billion, up 1.5% from the prior-year quarter.

FAST's full-year Zacks Consensus Estimates are calling for earnings of $1.45 per share and revenue of $5.60 billion. These results would represent year-over-year changes of +5.07% and +4.95%, respectively.

It is also important to note the recent changes to analyst estimates for FAST. These revisions help to show the ever-changing nature of near-term business trends. As a result, we can interpret positive estimate revisions as a good sign for 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.

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 1.36% higher. FAST currently has a Zacks Rank of #3 (Hold).

Valuation is also important, so investors should note that FAST has a Forward P/E ratio of 33.38 right now. For comparison, its industry has an average Forward P/E of 16.87, which means FAST is trading at a premium to the group.

Investors should also note that FAST has a PEG ratio of 3.71 right now. 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. FAST's industry had an average PEG ratio of 1.2 as of yesterday's close.

The Building Products - Retail industry is part of the Retail-Wholesale sector. This group has a Zacks Industry Rank of 21, putting it in the top 9% of all 250+ industries.

The Zacks Industry Rank includes is listed in order from best to worst in terms of the average Zacks Rank of the individual companies within each of these sectors. 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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