Graphic Packaging (GPK) Gains But Lags Market: What You Should Know

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The latest trading session saw Graphic Packaging (GPK) ending at $27.21, denoting a +0.37% adjustment from its last day's close. This move lagged the S&P 500's daily gain of 0.57%. On the other hand, the Dow registered a gain of 0.83%, and the technology-centric Nasdaq increased by 0.39%.

Heading into today, shares of the packaging company had gained 9.89% over the past month, outpacing the Industrial Products sector's gain of 5.08% and the S&P 500's gain of 2.97% in that time.

The investment community will be paying close attention to the earnings performance of Graphic Packaging in its upcoming release. The company is expected to report EPS of $0.63, down 18.18% from the prior-year quarter. At the same time, our most recent consensus estimate is projecting a revenue of $2.39 billion, reflecting a 1.82% fall from the equivalent quarter last year.

For the full year, the Zacks Consensus Estimates are projecting earnings of $2.71 per share and revenue of $9.65 billion, which would represent changes of -6.87% and +2.4%, respectively, from the prior year.

It is also important to note the recent changes to analyst estimates for Graphic Packaging. These revisions help to show the ever-changing nature of near-term business trends. As a result, upbeat changes in estimates indicate analysts' favorable outlook on the company's business health and profitability.

Based on our research, we believe these estimate revisions are directly related to near-team stock moves. 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, running from #1 (Strong Buy) to #5 (Strong Sell), holds an admirable track record of superior performance, independently audited, with #1 stocks contributing an average annual return of +25% since 1988. Over the past month, there's been a 3.63% fall in the Zacks Consensus EPS estimate. At present, Graphic Packaging boasts a Zacks Rank of #3 (Hold).

In the context of valuation, Graphic Packaging is at present trading with a Forward P/E ratio of 10.02. This valuation marks a discount compared to its industry's average Forward P/E of 15.07.

The Containers - Paper and Packaging industry is part of the Industrial Products sector. This group has a Zacks Industry Rank of 147, putting it in the bottom 42% of all 250+ industries.

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

You can find more information on all of these metrics, and much more, on Zacks.com.

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