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Home Depot (HD) Gains But Lags Market: What You Should Know

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Home Depot (HD - Free Report) closed at $335.93 in the latest trading session, marking a +0.51% move from the prior day. This change lagged the S&P 500's 0.95% gain on the day.

Heading into today, shares of the home-improvement retailer had gained 2.87% over the past month, outpacing the Retail-Wholesale sector's gain of 0.55% and the S&P 500's loss of 1.87% in that time.

Investors will be hoping for strength from HD as it approaches its next earnings release. On that day, HD is projected to report earnings of $3.30 per share, which would represent year-over-year growth of 3.77%. Our most recent consensus estimate is calling for quarterly revenue of $34.16 billion, up 1.87% from the year-ago period.

Looking at the full year, our Zacks Consensus Estimates suggest analysts are expecting earnings of $14.46 per share and revenue of $144.97 billion. These totals would mark changes of +20.2% and +9.73%, respectively, from last year.

Investors should also note any recent changes to analyst estimates for HD. 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.

Research indicates that these estimate revisions are directly correlated with near-term share price momentum. We developed the Zacks Rank to capitalize on this phenomenon. Our system takes these estimate changes into account and delivers a clear, actionable rating model.

The Zacks Rank system, which ranges from #1 (Strong Buy) to #5 (Strong Sell), has an impressive outside-audited track record of outperformance, with #1 stocks generating an average annual return of +25% since 1988. Within the past 30 days, our consensus EPS projection remained stagnant. HD is currently sporting a Zacks Rank of #3 (Hold).

Looking at its valuation, HD is holding a Forward P/E ratio of 23.12. Its industry sports an average Forward P/E of 15.2, so we one might conclude that HD is trading at a premium comparatively.

We can also see that HD currently has a PEG ratio of 2.02. The PEG ratio is similar to the widely-used P/E ratio, but this metric also takes the company's expected earnings growth rate into account. The Building Products - Retail industry currently had an average PEG ratio of 1.65 as of yesterday's close.

The Building Products - Retail industry is part of the Retail-Wholesale sector. This group has a Zacks Industry Rank of 56, putting it in the top 23% of all 250+ industries.

The Zacks Industry Rank includes is listed in order from best to worst in terms of the average Zacks Rank of the individual companies within each of these sectors. Our research shows that the top 50% rated industries outperform the bottom half by a factor of 2 to 1.

Be sure to follow all of these stock-moving metrics, and many more, on Zacks.com.


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