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Livent (LTHM) Stock Sinks As Market Gains: What You Should Know

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In the latest trading session, Livent closed at $21.85, marking a -0.73% move from the previous day. This move lagged the S&P 500's daily gain of 0.83%. At the same time, the Dow added 0.8%, and the tech-heavy Nasdaq gained 4.46%.

Heading into today, shares of the supplier of performance lithium compounds had gained 1.06% over the past month, outpacing the Basic Materials sector's gain of 0.87% and lagging the S&P 500's gain of 4.04% in that time.

Investors will be hoping for strength from Livent as it approaches its next earnings release, which is expected to be May 2, 2023. In that report, analysts expect Livent to post earnings of $0.39 per share. This would mark year-over-year growth of 85.71%. Meanwhile, the Zacks Consensus Estimate for revenue is projecting net sales of $242.15 million, up 68.75% from the year-ago period.

LTHM's full-year Zacks Consensus Estimates are calling for earnings of $1.83 per share and revenue of $1.09 billion. These results would represent year-over-year changes of +30.71% and +33.92%, respectively.

It is also important to note the recent changes to analyst estimates for Livent. These revisions help to show the ever-changing nature of near-term business trends. As a result, we can interpret positive estimate revisions as a good sign for the company's business outlook.

Research indicates that these estimate revisions are directly correlated with near-term share price momentum. Investors can capitalize on this by using the Zacks Rank. This model considers these estimate changes and provides a simple, actionable rating system.

Ranging from #1 (Strong Buy) to #5 (Strong Sell), the Zacks Rank system has a proven, outside-audited track record of outperformance, with #1 stocks returning an average of +25% annually since 1988. Within the past 30 days, our consensus EPS projection has moved 3.97% lower. Livent is currently a Zacks Rank #3 (Hold).

In terms of valuation, Livent is currently trading at a Forward P/E ratio of 12.03. Its industry sports an average Forward P/E of 15.84, so we one might conclude that Livent is trading at a discount comparatively.

Also, we should mention that LTHM has a PEG ratio of 0.36. 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. Chemical - Specialty stocks are, on average, holding a PEG ratio of 2.16 based on yesterday's closing prices.

The Chemical - Specialty industry is part of the Basic Materials sector. This industry currently has a Zacks Industry Rank of 203, which puts it in the bottom 20% 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.

To follow LTHM in the coming trading sessions, be sure to utilize Zacks.com.

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