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Activision Blizzard (ATVI) Dips More Than Broader Markets: What You Should Know

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In the latest trading session, Activision Blizzard closed at $47.01, marking a -1.18% move from the previous day. This change lagged the S&P 500's 0.61% loss on the day. At the same time, the Dow lost 0.72%, and the tech-heavy Nasdaq lost 0.56%.

Heading into today, shares of the maker of "Call of Duty" and other video games had gained 10.83% over the past month, outpacing the Consumer Discretionary sector's gain of 3.7% and the S&P 500's gain of 5.68% in that time.

Investors will be hoping for strength from ATVI as it approaches its next earnings release, which is expected to be May 2, 2019. In that report, analysts expect ATVI to post earnings of $0.26 per share. This would mark a year-over-year decline of 31.58%. Meanwhile, the Zacks Consensus Estimate for revenue is projecting net sales of $1.24 billion, down 10.39% from the year-ago period.

For the full year, our Zacks Consensus Estimates are projecting earnings of $2.23 per share and revenue of $6.49 billion, which would represent changes of -14.23% and -10.64%, respectively, from the prior year.

Investors might also notice recent changes to analyst estimates for ATVI. Recent revisions tend to reflect the latest near-term business trends. As such, positive estimate revisions reflect analyst optimism about the company's business and profitability.

Our research shows that these estimate changes are directly correlated with near-term stock prices. 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, the Zacks Consensus EPS estimate remained stagnant. ATVI currently has a Zacks Rank of #3 (Hold).

Digging into valuation, ATVI currently has a Forward P/E ratio of 21.34. Its industry sports an average Forward P/E of 21.85, so we one might conclude that ATVI is trading at a discount comparatively.

It is also worth noting that ATVI currently has a PEG ratio of 2.11. The PEG ratio is similar to the widely-used P/E ratio, but this metric also takes the company's expected earnings growth rate into account. The Toys - Games - Hobbies was holding an average PEG ratio of 1.88 at yesterday's closing price.

The Toys - Games - Hobbies industry is part of the Consumer Discretionary sector. This industry currently has a Zacks Industry Rank of 100, which puts it in the top 40% of all 250+ industries.

The Zacks Industry Rank gauges the strength of our individual industry groups by measuring the average Zacks Rank of the individual stocks within the groups. Our research shows that the top 50% rated industries outperform the bottom half by a factor of 2 to 1.

Make sure to utilize Zacks. Com to follow all of these stock-moving metrics, and more, in the coming trading sessions.

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