Novartis (NVS) Advances While Market Declines: Some Information for Investors
In the latest trading session, Novartis (NVS) closed at $101.37, marking a +0.66% move from the previous day. The stock's change was more than the S&P 500's daily loss of 0.11%. Meanwhile, the Dow gained 0.12%, and the Nasdaq, a tech-heavy index, lost 0.41%.
Prior to today's trading, shares of the drugmaker had lost 0.32% over the past month. This has lagged the Medical sector's gain of 3.03% and the S&P 500's gain of 2.7% in that time.
The investment community will be closely monitoring the performance of Novartis in its forthcoming earnings report. It is anticipated that the company will report an EPS of $1.73, marking a 1.17% rise compared to the same quarter of the previous year. At the same time, our most recent consensus estimate is projecting a revenue of $11.43 billion, reflecting a 11.75% fall from the equivalent quarter last year.
Regarding the entire year, the Zacks Consensus Estimates forecast earnings of $7.18 per share and revenue of $47.44 billion, indicating changes of +4.06% and -4.69%, respectively, compared to the previous year.
Furthermore, it would be beneficial for investors to monitor any recent shifts in analyst projections for Novartis. 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.
Our research shows that these estimate changes are directly correlated with near-term stock prices. 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, stretching from #1 (Strong Buy) to #5 (Strong Sell), has a noteworthy track record of outperforming, validated by third-party audits, with stocks rated #1 producing an average annual return of +25% since the year 1988. Over the last 30 days, the Zacks Consensus EPS estimate has witnessed a 0.81% decrease. Novartis is holding a Zacks Rank of #3 (Hold) right now.
In terms of valuation, Novartis is presently being traded at a Forward P/E ratio of 14.03. Its industry sports an average Forward P/E of 14.4, so one might conclude that Novartis is trading at a discount comparatively.
One should further note that NVS currently holds a PEG ratio of 1.56. 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. As the market closed yesterday, the Large Cap Pharmaceuticals industry was having an average PEG ratio of 1.67.
The Large Cap Pharmaceuticals industry is part of the Medical sector. With its current Zacks Industry Rank of 190, this industry ranks in the bottom 25% of all industries, numbering over 250.
The Zacks Industry Rank gauges the strength of our 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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Novartis AG (NVS) : Free Stock Analysis Report
