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Walgreens Boots Alliance (WBA) Stock Sinks As Market Gains: What You Should Know

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Walgreens Boots Alliance (WBA - Free Report) closed the most recent trading day at $57.80, moving -0.14% from the previous trading session. This change lagged the S&P 500's 0.72% gain on the day. Meanwhile, the Dow gained 0.36%, and the Nasdaq, a tech-heavy index, added 0.91%.

Coming into today, shares of the largest U.S. drugstore chain had lost 6.55% in the past month. In that same time, the Retail-Wholesale sector gained 2.1%, while the S&P 500 gained 2.64%.

Wall Street will be looking for positivity from WBA as it approaches its next earnings report date. This is expected to be January 8, 2020. In that report, analysts expect WBA to post earnings of $1.39 per share. This would mark a year-over-year decline of 4.79%. Meanwhile, our latest consensus estimate is calling for revenue of $34.59 billion, up 2.36% from the prior-year quarter.

Looking at the full year, our Zacks Consensus Estimates suggest analysts are expecting earnings of $5.93 per share and revenue of $139.86 billion. These totals would mark changes of -1% and +2.19%, respectively, from last year.

Investors might also notice recent changes to analyst estimates for WBA. 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.

Research indicates that these estimate revisions are directly correlated with near-term share price momentum. To benefit from this, we have developed the Zacks Rank, a proprietary model which takes these estimate changes into account and provides an actionable rating system.

The Zacks Rank system ranges from #1 (Strong Buy) to #5 (Strong Sell). It has a remarkable, outside-audited track record of success, with #1 stocks delivering an average annual return of +25% since 1988. Over the past month, the Zacks Consensus EPS estimate remained stagnant. WBA is currently sporting a Zacks Rank of #3 (Hold).

Digging into valuation, WBA currently has a Forward P/E ratio of 9.75. For comparison, its industry has an average Forward P/E of 10.47, which means WBA is trading at a discount to the group.

Meanwhile, WBA's PEG ratio is currently 1.44. This popular metric is similar to the widely-known P/E ratio, with the difference being that the PEG ratio also takes into account the company's expected earnings growth rate. Retail - Pharmacies and Drug Stores stocks are, on average, holding a PEG ratio of 1.44 based on yesterday's closing prices.

The Retail - Pharmacies and Drug Stores industry is part of the Retail-Wholesale sector. This group has a Zacks Industry Rank of 100, putting 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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