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Lockheed Martin (LMT) Gains But Lags Market: What You Should Know

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Lockheed Martin (LMT - Free Report) closed at $305.53 in the latest trading session, marking a +0.71% move from the prior day. The stock lagged the S&P 500's daily gain of 1.06%. At the same time, the Dow added 0.83%, and the tech-heavy Nasdaq gained 1.72%.

Heading into today, shares of the aerospace and defense company had lost 9% over the past month, lagging the Aerospace sector's loss of 4.71% and the S&P 500's loss of 2.09% in that time.

Wall Street will be looking for positivity from LMT as it approaches its next earnings report date. This is expected to be February 4, 2019. The company is expected to report EPS of $4.34, up 0.93% from the prior-year quarter. Meanwhile, our latest consensus estimate is calling for revenue of $13.72 billion, down 9.33% from the prior-year quarter.

For the full year, our Zacks Consensus Estimates are projecting earnings of $17.52 per share and revenue of $53.04 billion, which would represent changes of +31.43% and +3.9%, respectively, from the prior year.

It is also important to note the recent changes to analyst estimates for LMT. 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. 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 3.1% higher within the past month. LMT currently has a Zacks Rank of #2 (Buy).

Digging into valuation, LMT currently has a Forward P/E ratio of 17.32. Its industry sports an average Forward P/E of 16.16, so we one might conclude that LMT is trading at a premium comparatively.

Investors should also note that LMT has a PEG ratio of 2.17 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 Aerospace - Defense was holding an average PEG ratio of 1.45 at yesterday's closing price.

The Aerospace - Defense industry is part of the Aerospace sector. This industry currently has a Zacks Industry Rank of 42, which puts it in the top 16% of all 250+ industries.

The Zacks Industry Rank gauges the strength of our individual 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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