The Business Services group has plenty of great stocks, but investors should always be looking for companies that are outperforming their peers. Has Rentokil Initial PLC (RTO) been one of those stocks this year? A quick glance at the company's year-to-date performance in comparison to the rest of the Business Services sector should help us answer this question.
Rentokil Initial PLC is a member of our Business Services group, which includes 258 different companies and currently sits at #5 in 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 proven system that emphasizes earnings estimates and estimate revisions, highlighting a variety of stocks that are displaying the right characteristics to beat the market over the next one to three months. Rentokil Initial PLC is currently sporting a Zacks Rank of #2 (Buy).
Over the past three months, the Zacks Consensus Estimate for RTO's full-year earnings has moved 0.3% higher. This means that analyst sentiment is stronger and the stock's earnings outlook is improving.
Based on the latest available data, RTO has gained about 7.9% so far this year. At the same time, Business Services stocks have lost an average of 9.4%. This means that Rentokil Initial PLC is outperforming the sector as a whole this year.
One other Business Services stock that has outperformed the sector so far this year is SGS SA (SGSOY). The stock is up 12.9% year-to-date.
For SGS SA, the consensus EPS estimate for the current year has increased 1.1% over the past three months. The stock currently has a Zacks Rank #2 (Buy).
Looking more specifically, Rentokil Initial PLC belongs to the Business - Services industry, which includes 27 individual stocks and currently sits at #50 in the Zacks Industry Rank. Stocks in this group have lost about 9.5% so far this year, so RTO is performing better this group in terms of year-to-date returns. SGS SA is also part of the same industry.
Going forward, investors interested in Business Services stocks should continue to pay close attention to Rentokil Initial PLC and SGS SA as they could maintain their solid performance.
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Rentokil Initial PLC (RTO): Free Stock Analysis Report SGS SA (SGSOY): Free Stock Analysis ReportThis article originally published on Zacks Investment Research (zacks.com).
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