Alaska Air Group (ALK) ended the recent trading session at $59.13, demonstrating a -6.69% change from the preceding day's closing price. This move lagged the S&P 500's daily gain of 0.47%. Elsewhere, the Dow gained 0.11%, while the tech-heavy Nasdaq added 0.94%.
Heading into today, shares of the airline had gained 10.48% over the past month, outpacing the Transportation sector's loss of 0.44% and the S&P 500's gain of 2.32%.
Market participants will be closely following the financial results of Alaska Air Group in its upcoming release. In that report, analysts expect Alaska Air Group to post earnings of $1.35 per share. This would mark a year-over-year decline of 40%. Meanwhile, the latest consensus estimate predicts the revenue to be $3.73 billion, indicating a 21.46% increase compared to the same quarter of the previous year.
For the full year, the Zacks Consensus Estimates project earnings of $3.38 per share and a revenue of $14.25 billion, demonstrating changes of -30.6% and +21.44%, respectively, from the preceding year.
Investors should also note any recent changes to analyst estimates for Alaska Air Group. These latest adjustments often mirror the shifting dynamics of short-term business patterns. With this in mind, we can consider positive estimate revisions a sign of optimism about the business outlook.
Our research shows that these estimate changes are directly correlated with near-term stock prices. To exploit this, we've formed the Zacks Rank, a quantitative model that includes these estimate changes and presents a viable rating system.
The Zacks Rank system, running from #1 (Strong Buy) to #5 (Strong Sell), holds an admirable track record of superior performance, independently audited, with #1 stocks contributing an average annual return of +25% since 1988. Over the last 30 days, the Zacks Consensus EPS estimate has remained unchanged. At present, Alaska Air Group boasts a Zacks Rank of #3 (Hold).
In terms of valuation, Alaska Air Group is currently trading at a Forward P/E ratio of 18.73. Its industry sports an average Forward P/E of 10.47, so one might conclude that Alaska Air Group is trading at a premium comparatively.
It's also important to note that ALK currently trades at a PEG ratio of 0.69. 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 Transportation - Airline industry had an average PEG ratio of 0.81 as trading concluded yesterday.
The Transportation - Airline industry is part of the Transportation sector. At present, this industry carries a Zacks Industry Rank of 55, placing it within the top 23% of over 250 industries.
The Zacks Industry Rank is ordered 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.
Ensure to harness Zacks.com to stay updated with all these stock-shifting metrics, among others, in the next trading sessions.
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Alaska Air Group, Inc. (ALK): Free Stock Analysis ReportThis article originally published on Zacks Investment Research (zacks.com).
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