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American Tower (AMT) Outpaces Stock Market Gains: What You Should Know

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In the latest trading session, American Tower (AMT - Free Report) closed at $245.03, marking a +1.8% move from the previous day. The stock outpaced the S&P 500's daily gain of 0.71%. Meanwhile, the Dow gained 0.27%, and the Nasdaq, a tech-heavy index, added 0.14%.

Coming into today, shares of the wireless communications infrastructure company had gained 3.01% in the past month. In that same time, the Finance sector gained 1.76%, while the S&P 500 gained 3.76%.

Investors will be hoping for strength from American Tower as it approaches its next earnings release. In that report, analysts expect American Tower to post earnings of $2.50 per share. This would mark year-over-year growth of 1.63%. Meanwhile, the Zacks Consensus Estimate for revenue is projecting net sales of $2.57 billion, up 18.92% from the year-ago period.

Looking at the full year, our Zacks Consensus Estimates suggest analysts are expecting earnings of $10.11 per share and revenue of $10.58 billion. These totals would mark changes of +4.77% and +13.08%, respectively, from last year.

Any recent changes to analyst estimates for American Tower should also be noted by investors. 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. Within the past 30 days, our consensus EPS projection has moved 4.15% lower. American Tower is currently a Zacks Rank #3 (Hold).

In terms of valuation, American Tower is currently trading at a Forward P/E ratio of 23.8. This valuation marks a premium compared to its industry's average Forward P/E of 15.45.

Also, we should mention that AMT has a PEG ratio of 1.82. This metric is used similarly to the famous P/E ratio, but the PEG ratio also takes into account the stock's expected earnings growth rate. AMT's industry had an average PEG ratio of 2.79 as of yesterday's close.

The REIT and Equity Trust - Other industry is part of the Finance sector. This industry currently has a Zacks Industry Rank of 112, which puts it in the top 45% 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.

Make sure to utilize Zacks.com to follow all of these stock-moving metrics, and more, in the coming trading sessions.


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