Is American Airlines (AAL) Stock Outpacing Its Transportation Peers This Year?

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For those looking to find strong Transportation stocks, it is prudent to search for companies in the group that are outperforming their peers. Is American Airlines (AAL) one of those stocks right now? Let's take a closer look at the stock's year-to-date performance to find out.

American Airlines is a member of our Transportation group, which includes 133 different companies and currently sits at #4 in the Zacks Sector Rank. The Zacks Sector Rank includes 16 different groups and is listed in order from best to worst in terms of the average Zacks Rank of the individual companies within each of these sectors.

The Zacks Rank is a proven system that emphasizes earnings estimates and estimate revisions, highlighting a variety of stocks that are displaying the right characteristics to beat the market over the next one to three months. American Airlines is currently sporting a Zacks Rank of #2 (Buy).

Over the past 90 days, the Zacks Consensus Estimate for AAL's full-year earnings has moved 39.7% higher. This is a sign of improving analyst sentiment and a positive earnings outlook trend.

Our latest available data shows that AAL has returned about 4.4% since the start of the calendar year. Meanwhile, stocks in the Transportation group have gained about 0.4% on average. This shows that American Airlines is outperforming its peers so far this year.

Matson (MATX) is another Transportation stock that has outperformed the sector so far this year. Since the beginning of the year, the stock has returned 1.3%.

The consensus estimate for Matson's current year EPS has increased 4.6% over the past three months. The stock currently has a Zacks Rank #1 (Strong Buy).

Looking more specifically, American Airlines belongs to the Transportation - Airline industry, a group that includes 32 individual stocks and currently sits at #40 in the Zacks Industry Rank. Stocks in this group have gained about 3.2% so far this year, so AAL is performing better this group in terms of year-to-date returns.

In contrast, Matson falls under the Transportation - Services industry. Currently, this industry has 27 stocks and is ranked #154. Since the beginning of the year, the industry has moved -9.1%.

Investors interested in the Transportation sector may want to keep a close eye on American Airlines and Matson as they attempt to continue their solid performance.

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