Are Business Services Stocks Lagging Acuity, Inc. (AYI) This Year?

The Business Services group has plenty of great stocks, but investors should always be looking for companies that are outperforming their peers. Is Acuity (AYI) one of those stocks right now? By taking a look at the stock's year-to-date performance in comparison to its Business Services peers, we might be able to answer that question.

Acuity is one of 253 companies in the Business Services group. The Business Services group currently sits at #2 within the Zacks Sector Rank. The Zacks Sector Rank includes 16 different groups and is listed in order from best to worst in terms of the average Zacks Rank of the individual companies within each of these sectors.

The Zacks Rank is a successful stock-picking model that emphasizes earnings estimates and estimate revisions. The system highlights a number of different stocks that could be poised to outperform the broader market over the next one to three months. Acuity is currently sporting a Zacks Rank of #2 (Buy).

Over the past 90 days, the Zacks Consensus Estimate for AYI's full-year earnings has moved 0.3% higher. This signals that analyst sentiment is improving and the stock's earnings outlook is more positive.

Our latest available data shows that AYI has returned about 16.1% since the start of the calendar year. At the same time, Business Services stocks have gained an average of 1.1%. This means that Acuity is performing better than its sector in terms of year-to-date returns.

Another stock in the Business Services sector, MasterCard (MA), has outperformed the sector so far this year. The stock's year-to-date return is 7.9%.

Over the past three months, MasterCard's consensus EPS estimate for the current year has increased 1.9%. The stock currently has a Zacks Rank #2 (Buy).

Looking more specifically, Acuity belongs to the Technology Services industry, a group that includes 118 individual stocks and currently sits at #67 in the Zacks Industry Rank. On average, stocks in this group have gained 45.3% this year, meaning that AYI is slightly underperforming its industry in terms of year-to-date returns.

MasterCard, however, belongs to the Financial Transaction Services industry. Currently, this 34-stock industry is ranked #55. The industry has moved +1% so far this year.

Going forward, investors interested in Business Services stocks should continue to pay close attention to Acuity and MasterCard as they could maintain their solid performance.

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This article originally published on Zacks Investment Research (zacks.com).

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