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General Mills (GIS) Dips More Than Broader Markets: What You Should Know

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General Mills (GIS - Free Report) closed at $67.63 in the latest trading session, marking a -0.63% move from the prior day. This change lagged the S&P 500's daily loss of 0.38%. Meanwhile, the Dow lost 0.5%, and the Nasdaq, a tech-heavy index, lost 0.05%.

Coming into today, shares of the maker of Cheerios cereal, Yoplait yogurt and other packaged foods had lost 2.63% in the past month. In that same time, the Consumer Staples sector lost 1.56%, while the S&P 500 lost 6.25%.

Wall Street will be looking for positivity from General Mills as it approaches its next earnings report date. The company is expected to report EPS of $0.83, up 1.22% from the prior-year quarter. Meanwhile, the Zacks Consensus Estimate for revenue is projecting net sales of $4.6 billion, up 1.66% from the year-ago period.

For the full year, our Zacks Consensus Estimates are projecting earnings of $3.78 per share and revenue of $18.78 billion, which would represent changes of -0.26% and +3.58%, respectively, from the prior year.

Investors should also note any recent changes to analyst estimates for General Mills. Recent revisions tend to reflect the latest near-term business trends. With this in mind, we can consider positive estimate revisions a sign of optimism about the company's business outlook.

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.

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. The Zacks Consensus EPS estimate remained stagnant within the past month. General Mills currently has a Zacks Rank of #3 (Hold).

Valuation is also important, so investors should note that General Mills has a Forward P/E ratio of 18.03 right now. This represents a discount compared to its industry's average Forward P/E of 18.52.

It is also worth noting that GIS currently has a PEG ratio of 2.4. This metric is used similarly to the famous P/E ratio, but the PEG ratio also takes into account the stock's expected earnings growth rate. Food - Miscellaneous stocks are, on average, holding a PEG ratio of 3.15 based on yesterday's closing prices.

The Food - Miscellaneous industry is part of the Consumer Staples sector. This group has a Zacks Industry Rank of 221, putting it in the bottom 14% 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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