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Fastenal (FAST) Stock Moves -0.14%: What You Should Know

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Fastenal (FAST - Free Report) closed at $55.29 in the latest trading session, marking a -0.14% move from the prior day. This change was narrower than the S&P 500's daily loss of 0.2%. Elsewhere, the Dow lost 0.59%, while the tech-heavy Nasdaq lost 1.54%.

Heading into today, shares of the maker of industrial and construction fasteners had gained 1.3% over the past month, lagging the Retail-Wholesale sector's gain of 3.95% and the S&P 500's gain of 4.14% in that time.

Fastenal will be looking to display strength as it nears its next earnings release. In that report, analysts expect Fastenal to post earnings of $0.53 per share. This would mark year-over-year growth of 6%. Meanwhile, the Zacks Consensus Estimate for revenue is projecting net sales of $1.89 billion, up 6.28% from the year-ago period.

FAST's full-year Zacks Consensus Estimates are calling for earnings of $1.98 per share and revenue of $7.35 billion. These results would represent year-over-year changes of +4.76% and +5.36%, respectively.

Investors should also note any recent changes to analyst estimates for Fastenal. These recent revisions tend to reflect the evolving nature of short-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. 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. Over the past month, the Zacks Consensus EPS estimate has moved 0.1% higher. Fastenal is currently sporting a Zacks Rank of #2 (Buy).

Valuation is also important, so investors should note that Fastenal has a Forward P/E ratio of 27.92 right now. For comparison, its industry has an average Forward P/E of 12.37, which means Fastenal is trading at a premium to the group.

Also, we should mention that FAST has a PEG ratio of 3.1. 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. Building Products - Retail stocks are, on average, holding a PEG ratio of 1.47 based on yesterday's closing prices.

The Building Products - Retail industry is part of the Retail-Wholesale sector. This group has a Zacks Industry Rank of 22, putting it in the top 9% 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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