For Immediate Release
Chicago, IL – November 12, 2021 – Zacks.com announces the list of stocks featured in the Analyst Blog. Every day the Zacks Equity Research analysts discuss the latest news and events impacting stocks and the financial markets. Stocks recently featured in the blog include: The Chemours Company
CC
, Lenovo Group Limited
LNVGY
, Ternium S.A.
TX
, Earthstone Energy, Inc.
ESTE
and LendingClub Corporation
LC
.
Here are highlights from Thursday’s Analyst Blog:
Inflation Hasn’t Hurt Sentiment, but Should You Play It Safe?
These conditions aren’t normal. Bull runs in markets are generally accompanied by lower inflation rates. And yet, the market barely hiccupped when the Labor Department’s Consumer Price Index (CPI) for October showed a 6.2% surge in prices, on top of a 5.4% increase in September, to record the
fastest increase in inflation since 1990
.
True that some of the optimism stems from the fact that wage rates continue to increase while jobless claims continue to fall. So, companies struggling with higher costs (Producers Price Index from the BLS shows an 8.6% inflation for October) because of supply chain issues and energy price increases have succeeded in passing on those higher costs to consumers. So far.
At some point though, something has to give.
Consumers won’t be flush with cash forever. In fact, some reports suggest that they will overspend this holiday season with the attitude of self-indulgence and deal with 2022 later. That could translate to slower demand next year as the higher food and sheltering costs sink in, unless job openings remain high and wages continue to rise. And this is likely to be the case, going by commentaries from companies operating in the manpower industry.
Rising vaccination rates and reducing death rates are already increasing optimism in the services sector, which should therefore come back/hold up next year. The producer’s side is constrained by the supply chain, which may be expected to normalize by the middle of 2022 when the construction markets are also likely to normalize. Energy prices are high on the Fed’s to-do list. So let’s see how that goes.
We basically have a couple of quarters of uncertainty, including a slight impact from the tapering of bond purchases set to begin next month. While tapering normally has a cooling effect on inflation, the Fed suspects that this time round, the increasing inflation is because of the supply chain, so it could actually have a negative impact on growth. This means that tapering will be gradual and slow.
But it still could pull some money out of riskier assets, including speculative stocks and cryptocurrencies.
So what’s the best way to play this market? We could do a couple of things. First, we could hunt for safe stocks and second, supplement these with stocks that have very high growth potential. And preferably, look at faster-growing industries to increase the odds of success.
The safest stocks are those that have an attractive growth profile, generate solid cash flows, pay a dividend and still trade at attractive valuations.
A case in point is Zacks #1 (Strong Buy) ranked
Chemours
, which belongs to the Chemical – Diversified industry (top 38%). The company is expected to grow 105% this year and 8% in the next. Earnings estimates for the two years are up 10% and 11%, respectively in the last 30 days.
Although impacted significantly by the pandemic, cash flows are bouncing back strongly. CC also pays a dividend that yields 3.17%. However, its P/E of 7.78X, P/S of 0.85X and PEG of 0.22 indicates that the shares are undervalued.
#2 (Buy) ranked
Lenovo Group
, which belongs to the Computer – Mini computers industry (top 27%) is expected to grow 74% this year. Although earnings growth is expected to be negative next year, the level of earnings will be well above 2020 levels. And estimates for both years continue to trend up.
The company continues to generate solid cash flows with no negative impact from the pandemic; understandably so because the pandemic was actually a big positive for the PC market. Its dividend yields 5.80%. And yet, its P/E of 6.62X, P/S of 0.18X and PEG of 0.43 say that investors are discounting the company’s potential.
Ternium
, which belongs to the Steel – Producers industry, has a Zacks #2 rank. Earnings are expected to grow 534% this year. Although expected to drop off next year, the estimated 2022 earnings are 4X the 2020 levels. The company has also generated solid cash flows all through the pandemic, something that should continue given the level of demand. And its dividend yields 5.16%. At the same time, its P/E of 2.13X, P/S of 0.57 and PEG of 0.12 indicates that the shares are cheap compared to the potential they offer.
And the following stocks look good in terms of their growth potential in 2022-
Earthstone Energy
is currently expected to grow 150% this year and 97% in the next. In the last 30 days, the Zacks Consensus Estimate for 2021 and 2022 earnings are up 7% and 19%, respectively.
Zacks #1 ranked
LendingClub
belongs to the Financial – Miscellaneous Services industry (top 26%). It is slated to grow earnings 107% to per share earnings of 11 cents this year from the $1.53 loss in 2020. Next year, it is expected to grow 1282% to $1.52, as the debilitating effect of the pandemic wears off.
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Past performance is no guarantee of future results. Inherent in any investment is the potential for loss
.
This material is being provided for informational purposes only and nothing herein constitutes investment, legal, accounting or tax advice, or a recommendation to buy, sell or hold a security. No recommendation or advice is being given as to whether any investment is suitable for a particular investor. It should not be assumed that any investments in securities, companies, sectors or markets identified and described were or will be profitable. All information is current as of the date of herein and is subject to change without notice. Any views or opinions expressed may not reflect those of the firm as a whole. Zacks Investment Research does not engage in investment banking, market making or asset management activities of any securities. These returns are from hypothetical portfolios consisting of stocks with Zacks Rank = 1 that were rebalanced monthly with zero transaction costs. These are not the returns of actual portfolios of stocks. The S&P 500 is an unmanaged index. Visit
https://www.zacks.com/performance
for information about the performance numbers displayed in this press release.
Tech IPOs With Massive Profit Potential
In the past few years, many popular platforms and like Uber and Airbnb finally made their way to the public markets. But the biggest paydays came from lesser-known names.
For example, electric carmaker X Peng shot up +299.4% in just 2 months. Think of it this way…
If you had put $5,000 into XPEV at its IPO in September 2020, you could have cashed out with $19,970 in November.
With record amounts of cash flooding into IPOs and a record-setting stock market, this year’s lineup could be even more lucrative.
See Zacks Hottest Tech IPOs Now >>
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