Investors interested in stocks from the Schools sector have probably already heard of American Public Education (APEI) and Lincoln Educational Services Corporation (LINC). But which of these two stocks offers value investors a better bang for their buck right now? We'll need to 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 Zacks Rank is a proven strategy that targets companies with positive earnings estimate revision trends, while our Style Scores work to grade companies based on specific traits.
American Public Education and Lincoln Educational Services Corporation are sporting Zacks Ranks of #1 (Strong Buy) and #3 (Hold), respectively, right now. Investors should feel comfortable knowing that APEI likely has seen a stronger improvement to its earnings outlook than LINC has recently. However, value investors will care about much more than just this.
Value investors also tend to look at a number of traditional, tried-and-true figures to help them find stocks that they believe are undervalued at their current share price levels.
The Style Score Value grade factors in a variety of key fundamental metrics, including the popular P/E ratio, P/S ratio, earnings yield, cash flow per share, and a number of other key stats that are commonly used by value investors.
APEI currently has a forward P/E ratio of 19.88, while LINC has a forward P/E of 35.87. We also note that APEI has a PEG ratio of 1.33. 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. LINC currently has a PEG ratio of 2.39.
Another notable valuation metric for APEI is its P/B ratio of 2.87. 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, LINC has a P/B of 5.13.
These metrics, and several others, help APEI earn a Value grade of B, while LINC has been given a Value grade of D.
APEI has seen stronger estimate revision activity and sports more attractive valuation metrics than LINC, so it seems like value investors will conclude that APEI is the superior option right now.
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American Public Education, Inc. (APEI): Free Stock Analysis Report Lincoln Educational Services Corporation (LINC): Free Stock Analysis ReportThis article originally published on Zacks Investment Research (zacks.com).
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