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Is Rent-A-Center (RCII) Outperforming Other Consumer Discretionary Stocks This Year?

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Investors focused on the Consumer Discretionary space have likely heard of Rent-A-Center , but is the stock performing well in comparison to the rest of its sector peers? One simple way to answer this question is to take a look at the year-to-date performance of RCII and the rest of the Consumer Discretionary group's stocks.

Rent-A-Center is one of 246 companies in the Consumer Discretionary group. The Consumer Discretionary group currently sits at #5 within the Zacks Sector Rank. The Zacks Sector Rank considers 16 different groups, measuring the average Zacks Rank of the individual stocks within the sector to gauge the strength of each group.

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. RCII is currently sporting a Zacks Rank of #1 (Strong Buy).

The Zacks Consensus Estimate for RCII's full-year earnings has moved 6.39% higher within the past quarter. This signals that analyst sentiment is improving and the stock's earnings outlook is more positive.

According to our latest data, RCII has moved about 26.56% on a year-to-date basis. In comparison, Consumer Discretionary companies have returned an average of 20.09%. As we can see, Rent-A-Center is performing better than its sector in the calendar year.

Looking more specifically, RCII belongs to the Consumer Services - Miscellaneous industry, a group that includes 10 individual stocks and currently sits at #96 in the Zacks Industry Rank. Stocks in this group have gained about 10.66% so far this year, so RCII is performing better this group in terms of year-to-date returns.

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

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