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American Tower (AMT) Outpaces Stock Market Gains: What You Should Know

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American Tower (AMT - Free Report) closed at $199.83 in the latest trading session, marking a +1.78% move from the prior day. This move outpaced the S&P 500's daily gain of 1.68%. Meanwhile, the Dow gained 1.06%, and the Nasdaq, a tech-heavy index, lost 1.7%.

Coming into today, shares of the wireless communications infrastructure company had lost 9.63% in the past month. In that same time, the Finance sector lost 10.86%, while the S&P 500 lost 6.68%.

Investors will be hoping for strength from American Tower as it approaches its next earnings release. The company is expected to report EPS of $2.42, down 5.1% from the prior-year quarter. Meanwhile, our latest consensus estimate is calling for revenue of $2.74 billion, up 3.07% from the prior-year quarter.

AMT's full-year Zacks Consensus Estimates are calling for earnings of $10 per share and revenue of $11.03 billion. These results would represent year-over-year changes of +2.46% and +2.93%, respectively.

Any recent changes to analyst estimates for American Tower should also be noted by investors. These recent revisions tend to reflect the evolving nature of short-term business trends. With this in mind, we can consider positive estimate revisions a sign of optimism about the company's business outlook.

Our research shows that these estimate changes are directly correlated with near-term stock prices. Investors can capitalize on this by using the Zacks Rank. This model considers these estimate changes and provides a simple, 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. The Zacks Consensus EPS estimate has moved 3.98% lower within the past month. American Tower currently has a Zacks Rank of #3 (Hold).

Digging into valuation, American Tower currently has a Forward P/E ratio of 19.63. Its industry sports an average Forward P/E of 10.88, so we one might conclude that American Tower is trading at a premium comparatively.

Also, we should mention that AMT has a PEG ratio of 1.92. 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. AMT's industry had an average PEG ratio of 2.42 as of yesterday's close.

The REIT and Equity Trust - Other industry is part of the Finance sector. This group has a Zacks Industry Rank of 150, putting it in the bottom 41% 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.

You can find more information on all of these metrics, and much more, on Zacks.com.


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