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Are Retail-Wholesale Stocks Lagging Abercrombie & Fitch (ANF) This Year?

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The Retail-Wholesale group has plenty of great stocks, but investors should always be looking for companies that are outperforming their peers. Is Abercrombie & Fitch (ANF - Free Report) one of those stocks right now? A quick glance at the company's year-to-date performance in comparison to the rest of the Retail-Wholesale sector should help us answer this question.

Abercrombie & Fitch is one of 219 companies in the Retail-Wholesale group. The Retail-Wholesale group currently sits at #7 within the Zacks Sector Rank. The Zacks Sector Rank considers 16 different sector groups. The average Zacks Rank of the individual stocks within the groups is measured, and the sectors are listed from best to worst.

The Zacks Rank is a successful stock-picking model that emphasizes earnings estimates and estimate revisions. The system highlights a number of different stocks that could be poised to outperform the broader market over the next one to three months. Abercrombie & Fitch is currently sporting a Zacks Rank of #1 (Strong Buy).

Over the past three months, the Zacks Consensus Estimate for ANF's full-year earnings has moved 6.2% higher. This signals that analyst sentiment is improving and the stock's earnings outlook is more positive.

Our latest available data shows that ANF has returned about 30.7% since the start of the calendar year. In comparison, Retail-Wholesale companies have returned an average of 8.9%. As we can see, Abercrombie & Fitch is performing better than its sector in the calendar year.

Another Retail-Wholesale stock, which has outperformed the sector so far this year, is Burberry Group PLC (BURBY - Free Report) . The stock has returned 13% year-to-date.

The consensus estimate for Burberry Group PLC's current year EPS has increased 0.2% over the past three months. The stock currently has a Zacks Rank #2 (Buy).

Looking more specifically, Abercrombie & Fitch belongs to the Retail - Apparel and Shoes industry, a group that includes 44 individual stocks and currently sits at #203 in the Zacks Industry Rank. On average, stocks in this group have lost 9.9% this year, meaning that ANF is performing better in terms of year-to-date returns. Burberry Group PLC is also part of the same industry.

Abercrombie & Fitch and Burberry Group PLC could continue their solid performance, so investors interested in Retail-Wholesale stocks should continue to pay close attention to these stocks.


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