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VEOEY or AWK: Which Is the Better Value Stock Right Now?

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Investors with an interest in Utility - Water Supply stocks have likely encountered both Veolia Environnement SA (VEOEY - Free Report) and American Water Works (AWK - Free Report) . But which of these two stocks presents investors with the better value opportunity right now? Let's 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 proven Zacks Rank emphasizes companies with positive estimate revision trends, and our Style Scores highlight stocks with specific traits.

Veolia Environnement SA and American Water Works are both sporting a Zacks Rank of # 2 (Buy) right now. The Zacks Rank favors stocks that have recently seen positive revisions to their earnings estimates, so investors should rest assured that both of these companies have improving earnings outlooks. 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.

Our Value category highlights undervalued companies by looking at a variety of key metrics, including the popular P/E ratio, as well as the P/S ratio, earnings yield, cash flow per share, and a variety of other fundamentals that have been used by value investors for years.

VEOEY currently has a forward P/E ratio of 7.57, while AWK has a forward P/E of 28.12. We also note that VEOEY has a PEG ratio of 0.80. This popular figure is similar to the widely-used P/E ratio, but the PEG ratio also considers a company's expected EPS growth rate. AWK currently has a PEG ratio of 3.51.

Another notable valuation metric for VEOEY is its P/B ratio of 1.51. 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, AWK has a P/B of 2.84.

These are just a few of the metrics contributing to VEOEY's Value grade of A and AWK's Value grade of D.

Both VEOEY and AWK are impressive stocks with solid earnings outlooks, but based on these valuation figures, we feel that VEOEY is the superior value option right now.


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American Water Works Company, Inc. (AWK) - free report >>

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