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Baidu Inc. (BIDU) Stock Sinks As Market Gains: What You Should Know

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Baidu Inc. (BIDU - Free Report) closed the most recent trading day at $109.04, moving -1.75% from the previous trading session. This change lagged the S&P 500's 0.26% gain on the day. At the same time, the Dow added 0.13%, and the tech-heavy Nasdaq gained 0.4%.

Prior to today's trading, shares of the web search company had gained 6.49% over the past month. This has outpaced the Computer and Technology sector's gain of 3.81% and the S&P 500's gain of 3.92% in that time.

BIDU will be looking to display strength as it nears its next earnings release. On that day, BIDU is projected to report earnings of $1.76 per share, which would represent a year-over-year decline of 36.46%. Our most recent consensus estimate is calling for quarterly revenue of $4.02 billion, down 2.08% from the year-ago period.

For the full year, our Zacks Consensus Estimates are projecting earnings of $5 per share and revenue of $15.67 billion, which would represent changes of -48.13% and +2.25%, respectively, from the prior year.

Any recent changes to analyst estimates for BIDU should also be noted by investors. These revisions help to show the ever-changing nature of near-term business trends. As such, positive estimate revisions reflect analyst optimism about the company's business and profitability.

Research indicates that these estimate revisions are directly correlated with near-term share price momentum. Investors can capitalize on this by using the Zacks Rank. This model considers these estimate changes and provides a simple, actionable rating system.

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. The Zacks Consensus EPS estimate has moved 29.88% higher within the past month. BIDU is holding a Zacks Rank of #3 (Hold) right now.

Digging into valuation, BIDU currently has a Forward P/E ratio of 22.18. Its industry sports an average Forward P/E of 26.21, so we one might conclude that BIDU is trading at a discount comparatively.

We can also see that BIDU currently has a PEG ratio of 8.02. 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. BIDU's industry had an average PEG ratio of 2.59 as of yesterday's close.

The Internet - Services industry is part of the Computer and Technology sector. This industry currently has a Zacks Industry Rank of 169, which puts it in the bottom 34% of all 250+ industries.

The Zacks Industry Rank includes is listed in order from best to worst in terms of the average Zacks Rank of the individual companies within each of these sectors. Our research shows that the top 50% rated industries outperform the bottom half by a factor of 2 to 1.

Be sure to follow all of these stock-moving metrics, and many more, on Zacks.com.


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