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Medical Properties (MPW) Gains But Lags Market: What You Should Know

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In the latest trading session, Medical Properties (MPW - Free Report) closed at $13.78, marking a +0.44% move from the previous day. This move lagged the S&P 500's daily gain of 1.19%. Meanwhile, the Dow gained 0.76%, and the Nasdaq, a tech-heavy index, added 0.29%.

Prior to today's trading, shares of the health care real estate investment trust had gained 23.05% over the past month. This has outpaced the Finance sector's gain of 6.33% and the S&P 500's gain of 4.06% in that time.

Wall Street will be looking for positivity from Medical Properties as it approaches its next earnings report date. In that report, analysts expect Medical Properties to post earnings of $0.43 per share. This would mark a year-over-year decline of 8.51%. Meanwhile, our latest consensus estimate is calling for revenue of $378.6 million, down 7.51% from the prior-year quarter.

Investors should also note any recent changes to analyst estimates for Medical Properties. Recent revisions tend to reflect the latest near-term business trends. As such, positive estimate revisions reflect analyst optimism about the company's business and profitability.

Based on our research, we believe these estimate revisions are directly related to near-team stock moves. 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.

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. Within the past 30 days, our consensus EPS projection has moved 0.98% lower. Medical Properties is currently a Zacks Rank #4 (Sell).

In terms of valuation, Medical Properties is currently trading at a Forward P/E ratio of 7.77. Its industry sports an average Forward P/E of 12.01, so we one might conclude that Medical Properties is trading at a discount comparatively.

We can also see that MPW currently has a PEG ratio of 0.78. 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. The REIT and Equity Trust - Other was holding an average PEG ratio of 2.07 at yesterday's closing price.

The REIT and Equity Trust - Other industry is part of the Finance sector. This group has a Zacks Industry Rank of 201, putting it in the bottom 21% 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.

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


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