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United Parcel Service (UPS) Outpaces Stock Market Gains: What You Should Know

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In the latest trading session, United Parcel Service (UPS - Free Report) closed at $165.78, marking a +1.92% move from the previous day. This change outpaced the S&P 500's 1.54% gain on the day. Meanwhile, the Dow gained 1.59%, and the Nasdaq, a tech-heavy index, added 0.98%.

Prior to today's trading, shares of the package delivery service had gained 12.39% over the past month. This has lagged the Transportation sector's gain of 12.65% and outpaced the S&P 500's gain of 8% in that time.

Investors will be hoping for strength from UPS as it approaches its next earnings release. In that report, analysts expect UPS to post earnings of $1.74 per share. This would mark a year-over-year decline of 15.94%. Our most recent consensus estimate is calling for quarterly revenue of $19.95 billion, up 8.93% from the year-ago period.

Looking at the full year, our Zacks Consensus Estimates suggest analysts are expecting earnings of $6.89 per share and revenue of $80.35 billion. These totals would mark changes of -8.5% and +8.45%, respectively, from last year.

Investors should also note any recent changes to analyst estimates for UPS. 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.

Research indicates that these estimate revisions are directly correlated with near-term share price momentum. Investors can capitalize on this by using the Zacks Rank. This model considers these estimate changes and provides a simple, actionable rating system.

Ranging from #1 (Strong Buy) to #5 (Strong Sell), the Zacks Rank system has a proven, outside-audited track record of outperformance, with #1 stocks returning an average of +25% annually since 1988. Over the past month, the Zacks Consensus EPS estimate has moved 3.36% higher. UPS is currently a Zacks Rank #2 (Buy).

Valuation is also important, so investors should note that UPS has a Forward P/E ratio of 23.61 right now. This valuation marks a premium compared to its industry's average Forward P/E of 19.43.

Meanwhile, UPS's PEG ratio is currently 3.04. 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 Transportation - Air Freight and Cargo industry currently had an average PEG ratio of 2.42 as of yesterday's close.

The Transportation - Air Freight and Cargo industry is part of the Transportation sector. This group has a Zacks Industry Rank of 7, putting it in the top 3% of all 250+ industries.

The Zacks Industry Rank gauges the strength of our individual 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.

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


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