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Asbury Automotive Group (ABG) Gains But Lags Market: What You Should Know

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Asbury Automotive Group (ABG - Free Report) closed the most recent trading day at $164.42, moving +0.5% from the previous trading session. This move lagged the S&P 500's daily gain of 0.62%. Elsewhere, the Dow gained 0.55%, while the tech-heavy Nasdaq lost 0.03%.

Coming into today, shares of the auto dealership chain had gained 0.27% in the past month. In that same time, the Retail-Wholesale sector lost 4.49%, while the S&P 500 gained 0.87%.

Wall Street will be looking for positivity from Asbury Automotive Group as it approaches its next earnings report date. In that report, analysts expect Asbury Automotive Group to post earnings of $5.89 per share. This would mark year-over-year growth of 32.66%. Meanwhile, our latest consensus estimate is calling for revenue of $2.37 billion, up 6.06% from the prior-year quarter.

For the full year, our Zacks Consensus Estimates are projecting earnings of $25.58 per share and revenue of $9.42 billion, which would represent changes of +98.29% and +32.09%, respectively, from the prior year.

Any recent changes to analyst estimates for Asbury Automotive Group should also be noted by investors. These revisions typically reflect the latest short-term business trends, which can change frequently. 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 ranges from #1 (Strong Buy) to #5 (Strong Sell). It has a remarkable, outside-audited track record of success, with #1 stocks delivering an average annual return of +25% since 1988. The Zacks Consensus EPS estimate remained stagnant within the past month. Asbury Automotive Group is currently a Zacks Rank #2 (Buy).

Digging into valuation, Asbury Automotive Group currently has a Forward P/E ratio of 6.43. For comparison, its industry has an average Forward P/E of 6.97, which means Asbury Automotive Group is trading at a discount to the group.

It is also worth noting that ABG currently has a PEG ratio of 0.35. 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. ABG's industry had an average PEG ratio of 0.36 as of yesterday's close.

The Automotive - Retail and Whole Sales industry is part of the Retail-Wholesale sector. This group has a Zacks Industry Rank of 24, putting it in the top 10% 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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