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LOVE or WSM: Which Is the Better Value Stock Right Now?

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Investors interested in stocks from the Retail - Home Furnishings sector have probably already heard of Lovesac (LOVE - Free Report) and Williams-Sonoma (WSM - 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.

We have found that the best way to discover great value opportunities is to pair a strong Zacks Rank with a great grade in the Value category of our Style Scores system. The Zacks Rank favors stocks with strong earnings estimate revision trends, and our Style Scores highlight companies with specific traits.

Lovesac has a Zacks Rank of #2 (Buy), while Williams-Sonoma has a Zacks Rank of #3 (Hold) right now. Investors should feel comfortable knowing that LOVE likely has seen a stronger improvement to its earnings outlook than WSM has recently. But this is just one factor that value investors are interested in.

Value investors also tend to look at a number of traditional, tried-and-true figures to help them find stocks 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.

LOVE currently has a forward P/E ratio of 14.18, while WSM has a forward P/E of 19.32. We also note that LOVE has a PEG ratio of 0.41. 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. WSM currently has a PEG ratio of 2.24.

Another notable valuation metric for LOVE is its P/B ratio of 1.08. Investors use the P/B ratio to look at a stock's market value versus its book value, which is defined as total assets minus total liabilities. By comparison, WSM has a P/B of 10.14.

Based on these metrics and many more, LOVE holds a Value grade of B, while WSM has a Value grade of C.

LOVE sticks out from WSM in both our Zacks Rank and Style Scores models, so value investors will likely feel that LOVE is the better option right now.

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