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Huntsman (HUN) Gains But Lags Market: What You Should Know

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Huntsman (HUN - Free Report) closed the most recent trading day at $38.29, moving +1.06% from the previous trading session. The stock lagged the S&P 500's daily gain of 1.23%. Meanwhile, the Dow gained 0.97%, and the Nasdaq, a tech-heavy index, added 0.44%.

Coming into today, shares of the chemical company had lost 6.31% in the past month. In that same time, the Basic Materials sector gained 9.15%, while the S&P 500 gained 4.69%.

Huntsman will be looking to display strength as it nears its next earnings release. In that report, analysts expect Huntsman to post earnings of $0.98 per share. This would mark year-over-year growth of 48.48%. Meanwhile, the Zacks Consensus Estimate for revenue is projecting net sales of $2.3 billion, up 25.14% from the year-ago period.

For the full year, our Zacks Consensus Estimates are projecting earnings of $3.99 per share and revenue of $8.98 billion, which would represent changes of +12.71% and +6.25%, respectively, from the prior year.

It is also important to note the recent changes to analyst estimates for Huntsman. These revisions help to show the ever-changing nature of near-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. To benefit from this, we have developed the Zacks Rank, a proprietary model which takes these estimate changes into account and provides an actionable rating system.

The Zacks Rank system ranges from #1 (Strong Buy) to #5 (Strong Sell). It has a remarkable, outside-audited track record of success, with #1 stocks delivering an average annual return of +25% since 1988. Within the past 30 days, our consensus EPS projection has moved 0.13% higher. Huntsman is currently a Zacks Rank #3 (Hold).

Investors should also note Huntsman's current valuation metrics, including its Forward P/E ratio of 9.49. For comparison, its industry has an average Forward P/E of 12.38, which means Huntsman is trading at a discount to the group.

The Chemical - Diversified industry is part of the Basic Materials sector. This industry currently has a Zacks Industry Rank of 178, which puts it in the bottom 30% 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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