United Airlines (UAL) Outpaces Stock Market Gains: What You Should Know

UAL

United Airlines (UAL - Free Report) ended the recent trading session at $43.04, demonstrating a +1.58% swing from the preceding day's closing price. This change outpaced the S&P 500's 0.74% gain on the day. Meanwhile, the Dow experienced a drop of 0.01%, and the technology-dominated Nasdaq saw an increase of 1.68%.

Coming into today, shares of the airline had lost 1.55% in the past month. In that same time, the Transportation sector gained 6.39%, while the S&P 500 gained 0.8%.

Analysts and investors alike will be keeping a close eye on the performance of United Airlines in its upcoming earnings disclosure. The company's earnings report is set to go public on April 16, 2024. On that day, United Airlines is projected to report earnings of -$0.52 per share, which would represent year-over-year growth of 17.46%. Meanwhile, our latest consensus estimate is calling for revenue of $12.45 billion, up 8.9% from the prior-year quarter.

Regarding the entire year, the Zacks Consensus Estimates forecast earnings of $9.58 per share and revenue of $57.47 billion, indicating changes of -4.68% and +6.98%, respectively, compared to the previous year.

Investors should also pay attention to any latest changes in analyst estimates for United Airlines. These revisions typically reflect the latest short-term business trends, which can change frequently. With this in mind, we can consider positive estimate revisions a sign of optimism about the company's business outlook.

Our research suggests that these changes in estimates have a direct relationship with upcoming stock price performance. To utilize this, we have created the Zacks Rank, a proprietary model that integrates these estimate changes and provides a functional rating system.

The Zacks Rank system, ranging from #1 (Strong Buy) to #5 (Strong Sell), possesses a remarkable history of outdoing, externally audited, with #1 stocks returning an average annual gain of +25% since 1988. Within the past 30 days, our consensus EPS projection has moved 1.38% lower. United Airlines is currently a Zacks Rank #3 (Hold).

Looking at valuation, United Airlines is presently trading at a Forward P/E ratio of 4.42. This represents a discount compared to its industry's average Forward P/E of 9.25.

One should further note that UAL currently holds a PEG ratio of 0.59. 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. UAL's industry had an average PEG ratio of 0.72 as of yesterday's close.

The Transportation - Airline industry is part of the Transportation sector. Currently, this industry holds a Zacks Industry Rank of 88, positioning it in the top 35% 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 use Zacks.com to monitor all these stock-influencing metrics, and more, throughout the forthcoming trading sessions.

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