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ASB or UMBF: Which Is the Better Value Stock Right Now?

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Investors interested in Banks - Midwest stocks are likely familiar with Associated Banc-Corp (ASB - Free Report) and UMB Financial (UMBF - Free Report) . But which of these two stocks offers value investors a better bang for their buck right now? We'll need to take a closer look.

There are plenty of strategies for discovering value stocks, but we have found that pairing a strong Zacks Rank with an impressive grade in the Value category of our Style Scores system produces the best returns. The proven Zacks Rank puts an emphasis on earnings estimates and estimate revisions, while our Style Scores work to identify stocks with specific traits.

Associated Banc-Corp and UMB Financial are sporting Zacks Ranks of #2 (Buy) and #3 (Hold), respectively, right now. This system places an emphasis on companies that have seen positive earnings estimate revisions, so investors should feel comfortable knowing that ASB is likely seeing its earnings outlook improve to a greater extent. But this is just one piece of the puzzle for value investors.

Value investors analyze a variety of traditional, tried-and-true metrics to help find companies that they believe are undervalued at their current share price levels.

Our Value category highlights undervalued companies by looking at a variety of key metrics, including the popular P/E ratio, as well as the P/S ratio, earnings yield, cash flow per share, and a variety of other fundamentals that have been used by value investors for years.

ASB currently has a forward P/E ratio of 10.22, while UMBF has a forward P/E of 11.79. We also note that ASB has a PEG ratio of 1.02. This figure is similar to the commonly-used P/E ratio, with the PEG ratio also factoring in a company's expected earnings growth rate. UMBF currently has a PEG ratio of 1.38.

Another notable valuation metric for ASB is its P/B ratio of 0.96. The P/B ratio pits a stock's market value against its book value, which is defined as total assets minus total liabilities. For comparison, UMBF has a P/B of 1.34.

These are just a few of the metrics contributing to ASB's Value grade of B and UMBF's Value grade of D.

ASB has seen stronger estimate revision activity and sports more attractive valuation metrics than UMBF, so it seems like value investors will conclude that ASB is the superior option right now.


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