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First Solar (FSLR) Outpaces Stock Market Gains: What You Should Know

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First Solar (FSLR - Free Report) closed the most recent trading day at $159.81, moving +0.28% from the previous trading session. The stock's performance was ahead of the S&P 500's daily gain of 0.01%. Meanwhile, the Dow experienced a drop of 0.22%, and the technology-dominated Nasdaq saw an increase of 0.32%.

Coming into today, shares of the largest U.S. solar company had gained 25.73% in the past month. In that same time, the Oils-Energy sector gained 4.32%, while the S&P 500 gained 5.2%.

The investment community will be paying close attention to the earnings performance of First Solar in its upcoming release. On that day, First Solar is projected to report earnings of $2.66 per share, which would represent a year-over-year decline of 18.15%. In the meantime, our current consensus estimate forecasts the revenue to be $1.01 billion, indicating a 0.4% growth compared to the corresponding quarter of the prior year.

In terms of the entire fiscal year, the Zacks Consensus Estimates predict earnings of $14.53 per share and a revenue of $4.88 billion, indicating changes of +20.88% and +15.99%, respectively, from the former year.

Any recent changes to analyst estimates for First Solar should also be noted by investors. Such recent modifications usually signify the changing landscape of near-term business trends. As a result, we can interpret positive estimate revisions as a good sign for the company's business outlook.

Based on our research, we believe these estimate revisions are directly related to near-team stock moves. We developed the Zacks Rank to capitalize on this phenomenon. Our system takes these estimate changes into account and delivers a clear, actionable rating model.

The Zacks Rank system, which ranges from #1 (Strong Buy) to #5 (Strong Sell), has an impressive outside-audited track record of outperformance, with #1 stocks generating an average annual return of +25% since 1988. Over the past month, there's been a 0.68% fall in the Zacks Consensus EPS estimate. First Solar presently features a Zacks Rank of #4 (Sell).

In terms of valuation, First Solar is currently trading at a Forward P/E ratio of 10.97. For comparison, its industry has an average Forward P/E of 15.01, which means First Solar is trading at a discount to the group.

We can additionally observe that FSLR currently boasts a PEG ratio of 0.32. The PEG ratio is akin to the commonly utilized P/E ratio, but this measure also incorporates the company's anticipated earnings growth rate. As the market closed yesterday, the Solar industry was having an average PEG ratio of 0.55.

The Solar industry is part of the Oils-Energy sector. With its current Zacks Industry Rank of 170, this industry ranks in the bottom 31% of all industries, numbering over 250.

The Zacks Industry Rank assesses the strength of our separate industry groups by calculating the average Zacks Rank of the individual stocks contained 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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