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Are Investors Undervaluing Veritiv (VRTV) Right Now?

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While the proven Zacks Rank places an emphasis on earnings estimates and estimate revisions to find strong stocks, we also know that investors tend to develop their own individual strategies. With this in mind, we are always looking at value, growth, and momentum trends to discover great companies.

Of these, value investing is easily one of the most popular ways to find great stocks in any market environment. Value investors use tried-and-true metrics and fundamental analysis to find companies that they believe are undervalued at their current share price levels.

In addition to the Zacks Rank, investors looking for stocks with specific traits can utilize our Style Scores system. Of course, value investors will be most interested in the system's "Value" category. Stocks with "A" grades for Value and high Zacks Ranks are among the best value stocks available at any given moment.

One stock to keep an eye on is Veritiv . VRTV is currently sporting a Zacks Rank of #2 (Buy) and an A for Value.

We also note that VRTV holds a PEG ratio of 0.59. This popular figure is similar to the widely-used P/E ratio, but the PEG ratio also considers a company's expected EPS growth rate. VRTV's industry has an average PEG of 1.17 right now. Over the last 12 months, VRTV's PEG has been as high as 0.59 and as low as 0.30, with a median of 0.45.

Value investors also love the P/S ratio, which is calculated by simply dividing a stock's price with the company's sales. This is a prefered metric because revenue can't really be manipulated, so sales are often a truer performance indicator. VRTV has a P/S ratio of 0.35. This compares to its industry's average P/S of 0.4.

These are only a few of the key metrics included in Veritiv's strong Value grade, but they help show that the stock is likely undervalued right now. When factoring in the strength of its earnings outlook, VRTV looks like an impressive value stock at the moment.

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