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Vertex Pharmaceuticals (VRTX) Gains As Market Dips: What You Should Know

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Vertex Pharmaceuticals (VRTX - Free Report) closed at $312.09 in the latest trading session, marking a +1.63% move from the prior day. The stock outpaced the S&P 500's daily loss of 0.61%. At the same time, the Dow lost 0.42%, and the tech-heavy Nasdaq gained 0.17%.

Prior to today's trading, shares of the drugmaker had gained 0.59% over the past month. This has lagged the Medical sector's gain of 5.48% and the S&P 500's gain of 0.89% in that time.

Investors will be hoping for strength from Vertex Pharmaceuticals as it approaches its next earnings release. In that report, analysts expect Vertex Pharmaceuticals to post earnings of $3.57 per share. This would mark year-over-year growth of 5.93%. Meanwhile, our latest consensus estimate is calling for revenue of $2.29 billion, up 10.6% from the prior-year quarter.

VRTX's full-year Zacks Consensus Estimates are calling for earnings of $14.65 per share and revenue of $8.91 billion. These results would represent year-over-year changes of +12.52% and +17.63%, respectively.

Any recent changes to analyst estimates for Vertex Pharmaceuticals 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. 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.

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. The Zacks Consensus EPS estimate has moved 0.31% higher within the past month. Vertex Pharmaceuticals currently has a Zacks Rank of #3 (Hold).

Investors should also note Vertex Pharmaceuticals's current valuation metrics, including its Forward P/E ratio of 20.96. This valuation marks a premium compared to its industry's average Forward P/E of 17.8.

Meanwhile, VRTX's PEG ratio is currently 2.25. 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. The Medical - Biomedical and Genetics was holding an average PEG ratio of 1.36 at yesterday's closing price.

The Medical - Biomedical and Genetics industry is part of the Medical sector. This industry currently has a Zacks Industry Rank of 57, which puts it in the top 23% 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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