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Freeport-McMoRan (FCX) Outpaces Stock Market Gains: What You Should Know

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In the latest trading session, Freeport-McMoRan (FCX - Free Report) closed at $48.48, marking a +0.87% move from the previous day. The stock outpaced the S&P 500's daily gain of 0.43%. Elsewhere, the Dow gained 0.25%, while the tech-heavy Nasdaq lost 0.01%.

Prior to today's trading, shares of the mining company had gained 2.28% over the past month. This has lagged the Basic Materials sector's gain of 3.2% and the S&P 500's gain of 3.69% in that time.

Investors will be hoping for strength from Freeport-McMoRan as it approaches its next earnings release, which is expected to be April 21, 2022. In that report, analysts expect Freeport-McMoRan to post earnings of $0.86 per share. This would mark year-over-year growth of 68.63%. Meanwhile, the Zacks Consensus Estimate for revenue is projecting net sales of $6.24 billion, up 28.56% from the year-ago period.

For the full year, our Zacks Consensus Estimates are projecting earnings of $3.78 per share and revenue of $26.3 billion, which would represent changes of +20.77% and +15.13%, respectively, from the prior year.

Investors might also notice recent changes to analyst estimates for Freeport-McMoRan. 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.

Based on our research, we believe these estimate revisions are directly related to near-team stock moves. 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 has moved 2.81% higher within the past month. Freeport-McMoRan is currently sporting a Zacks Rank of #3 (Hold).

In terms of valuation, Freeport-McMoRan is currently trading at a Forward P/E ratio of 12.71. For comparison, its industry has an average Forward P/E of 10.09, which means Freeport-McMoRan is trading at a premium to the group.

Investors should also note that FCX has a PEG ratio of 0.44 right now. 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 Mining - Non Ferrous industry currently had an average PEG ratio of 0.44 as of yesterday's close.

The Mining - Non Ferrous industry is part of the Basic Materials sector. This industry currently has a Zacks Industry Rank of 215, which puts it in the bottom 16% of all 250+ industries.

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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