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General Mills (GIS) Outpaces Stock Market Gains: What You Should Know

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General Mills (GIS - Free Report) closed the most recent trading day at $44.32, moving +1.19% from the previous trading session. This change outpaced the S&P 500's 0.65% gain on the day. Elsewhere, the Dow gained 0.79%, while the tech-heavy Nasdaq added 1.01%.

Prior to today's trading, shares of the maker of Cheerios cereal, Yoplait yogurt and other packaged foods had gained 1.86% over the past month. This has outpaced the Consumer Staples sector's loss of 2.45% and the S&P 500's loss of 6.82% in that time.

Wall Street will be looking for positivity from GIS as it approaches its next earnings report date. This is expected to be December 19, 2018. On that day, GIS is projected to report earnings of $0.82 per share, which would represent no growth from the prior-year quarter. Our most recent consensus estimate is calling for quarterly revenue of $4.52 billion, up 7.54% from the year-ago period.

Looking at the full year, our Zacks Consensus Estimates suggest analysts are expecting earnings of $3.07 per share and revenue of $17.09 billion. These totals would mark changes of -1.29% and +8.55%, respectively, from last year.

Investors should also note any recent changes to analyst estimates for GIS. These recent revisions tend to reflect the evolving nature of short-term business trends. As such, positive estimate revisions reflect analyst optimism about the company's business and profitability.

Our research shows that these estimate changes are directly correlated with near-term stock prices. 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. The Zacks Consensus EPS estimate has moved 0.04% higher within the past month. GIS is currently sporting a Zacks Rank of #3 (Hold).

Valuation is also important, so investors should note that GIS has a Forward P/E ratio of 14.26 right now. This represents a discount compared to its industry's average Forward P/E of 17.27.

Investors should also note that GIS has a PEG ratio of 1.84 right now. 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. The Food - Miscellaneous industry currently had an average PEG ratio of 2.01 as of yesterday's close.

The Food - Miscellaneous industry is part of the Consumer Staples sector. This industry currently has a Zacks Industry Rank of 191, which puts it in the bottom 25% 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.

You can find more information on all of these metrics, and much more, on Zacks.com.


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