Waste Management (WM) Gains As Market Dips: What You Should Know

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Waste Management (WM) closed at $159.50 in the latest trading session, marking a +0.18% move from the prior day. The stock outpaced the S&P 500's daily loss of 0.41%. Meanwhile, the Dow gained 0.11%, and the Nasdaq, a tech-heavy index, lost 6.67%.

Coming into today, shares of the garbage and recycling hauler had lost 3.27% in the past month. In that same time, the Business Services sector lost 4.65%, while the S&P 500 lost 4.4%.

Waste Management will be looking to display strength as it nears its next earnings release, which is expected to be February 1, 2023. The company is expected to report EPS of $1.42, up 12.7% from the prior-year quarter. Meanwhile, the Zacks Consensus Estimate for revenue is projecting net sales of $4.98 billion, up 6.56% from the year-ago period.

WM's full-year Zacks Consensus Estimates are calling for earnings of $5.70 per share and revenue of $19.75 billion. These results would represent year-over-year changes of +17.77% and +10.13%, respectively.

Investors should also note any recent changes to analyst estimates for Waste Management. These revisions help to show the ever-changing nature of near-term business trends. With this in mind, we can consider positive estimate revisions a sign of optimism about the company's business outlook.

Research indicates that these estimate revisions are directly correlated with near-term share price momentum. 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, which ranges from #1 (Strong Buy) to #5 (Strong Sell), has an impressive outside-audited track record of outperformance, with #1 stocks generating an average annual return of +25% since 1988. Over the past month, the Zacks Consensus EPS estimate remained stagnant. Waste Management is holding a Zacks Rank of #3 (Hold) right now.

In terms of valuation, Waste Management is currently trading at a Forward P/E ratio of 27.92. This valuation marks a premium compared to its industry's average Forward P/E of 23.95.

It is also worth noting that WM currently has a PEG ratio of 2.22. The PEG ratio is similar to the widely-used P/E ratio, but this metric also takes the company's expected earnings growth rate into account. The Waste Removal Services industry currently had an average PEG ratio of 2.22 as of yesterday's close.

The Waste Removal Services industry is part of the Business Services sector. This industry currently has a Zacks Industry Rank of 155, which puts it in the bottom 39% of all 250+ industries.

The Zacks Industry Rank includes is listed in order from best to worst in terms of the average Zacks Rank of the individual companies within each of these sectors. Our research shows that the top 50% rated industries outperform the bottom half by a factor of 2 to 1.

Be sure to follow all of these stock-moving metrics, and many more, on Zacks.com.

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