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BCOR vs. TRI: Which Stock Should Value Investors Buy Now?

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Investors looking for stocks in the Technology Services sector might want to consider either Blucora or Thomson Reuters (TRI - Free Report) . But which of these two stocks is more attractive to value investors? We'll need to take a closer look to find out.

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 Zacks Rank favors stocks with strong earnings estimate revision trends, and our Style Scores highlight companies with specific traits.

Blucora and Thomson Reuters are sporting Zacks Ranks of #1 (Strong Buy) and #2 (Buy), respectively, right now. The Zacks Rank favors stocks that have recently seen positive revisions to their earnings estimates, so investors should rest assured that BCOR has an improving earnings outlook. But this is just one factor that value investors are interested in.

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.

BCOR currently has a forward P/E ratio of 5.49, while TRI has a forward P/E of 37.33. We also note that BCOR has a PEG ratio of 0.27. 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. TRI currently has a PEG ratio of 2.98.

Another notable valuation metric for BCOR 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, TRI has a P/B of 3.69.

These are just a few of the metrics contributing to BCOR's Value grade of A and TRI's Value grade of C.

BCOR stands above TRI thanks to its solid earnings outlook, and based on these valuation figures, we also feel that BCOR is the superior value option right now.


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