Investors interested in Medical stocks should always be looking to find the best-performing companies in the group. Has Novavax (NVAX Quick QuoteNVAX - Free Report) been one of those stocks this year? Let's take a closer look at the stock's year-to-date performance to find out.

Novavax is a member of our Medical group, which includes 765 different companies and currently sits at #14 in the Zacks Sector Rank. The Zacks Sector Rank includes 16 different groups and is listed in order from best to worst in terms of the average Zacks Rank of the individual companies within each of these sectors.

The Zacks Rank is a successful stock-picking model that emphasizes earnings estimates and estimate revisions. The system highlights a number of different stocks that could be poised to outperform the broader market over the next one to three months. NVAX is currently sporting a Zacks Rank of #2 (Buy).

Over the past 90 days, the Zacks Consensus Estimate for NVAX's full-year earnings has moved 6.18% higher. This shows that analyst sentiment has improved and the company's earnings outlook is stronger.

Based on the latest available data, NVAX has gained about 32.26% so far this year. Meanwhile, the Medical sector has returned an average of -2.67% on a year-to-date basis. This shows that Novavax is outperforming its peers so far this year.

To break things down more, NVAX belongs to the Medical - Biomedical and Genetics industry, a group that includes 283 individual companies and currently sits at #159 in the Zacks Industry Rank. On average, stocks in this group have lost 7% this year, meaning that NVAX is performing better in terms of year-to-date returns.

Investors in the Medical sector will want to keep a close eye on NVAX as it attempts to continue its solid performance.