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URI or MAS: Which Is the Better Value Stock Right Now?

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Investors with an interest in Building Products - Miscellaneous stocks have likely encountered both United Rentals (URI - Free Report) and Masco (MAS - Free Report) . But which of these two companies is the best option for those looking for undervalued stocks? Let's take a closer look.

There are plenty of strategies for discovering value stocks, but we have found that pairing a strong Zacks Rank with an impressive grade in the Value category of our Style Scores system produces the best returns. The proven Zacks Rank puts an emphasis on earnings estimates and estimate revisions, while our Style Scores work to identify stocks with specific traits.

Currently, United Rentals has a Zacks Rank of #2 (Buy), while Masco has a Zacks Rank of #3 (Hold). This system places an emphasis on companies that have seen positive earnings estimate revisions, so investors should feel comfortable knowing that URI is likely seeing its earnings outlook improve to a greater extent. But this is only part of the picture for value investors.

Value investors analyze a variety of traditional, tried-and-true metrics to help find companies that they believe are undervalued at their current share price levels.

Our Value category highlights undervalued companies by looking at a variety of key metrics, including the popular P/E ratio, as well as the P/S ratio, earnings yield, cash flow per share, and a variety of other fundamentals that have been used by value investors for years.

URI currently has a forward P/E ratio of 17.93, while MAS has a forward P/E of 20.28. We also note that URI has a PEG ratio of 1.84. 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. MAS currently has a PEG ratio of 2.61.

Another notable valuation metric for URI is its P/B ratio of 6.36. Investors use the P/B ratio to look at a stock's market value versus its book value, which is defined as total assets minus total liabilities. By comparison, MAS has a P/B of 99.84.

These metrics, and several others, help URI earn a Value grade of B, while MAS has been given a Value grade of C.

URI sticks out from MAS in both our Zacks Rank and Style Scores models, so value investors will likely feel that URI is the better option right now.


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