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Is Encompass Health (EHC) Stock Undervalued Right Now?

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While the proven Zacks Rank places an emphasis on earnings estimates and estimate revisions to find strong stocks, we also know that investors tend to develop their own individual strategies. With this in mind, we are always looking at value, growth, and momentum trends to discover great companies.

Of these, value investing is easily one of the most popular ways to find great stocks in any market environment. Value investors use fundamental analysis and traditional valuation metrics to find stocks that they believe are being undervalued by the market at large.

Luckily, Zacks has developed its own Style Scores system in an effort to find stocks with specific traits. Value investors will be interested in the system's "Value" category. Stocks with both "A" grades in the Value category and high Zacks Ranks are among the strongest value stocks on the market right now.

One company value investors might notice is Encompass Health (EHC - Free Report) . EHC is currently sporting a Zacks Rank of #2 (Buy) and an A for Value. The stock is trading with P/E ratio of 20.91 right now. For comparison, its industry sports an average P/E of 21.19. Over the past year, EHC's Forward P/E has been as high as 21.55 and as low as 16.27, with a median of 19.44.

Investors will also notice that EHC has a PEG ratio of 1.33. 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. EHC's industry currently sports an average PEG of 1.72. Over the last 12 months, EHC's PEG has been as high as 1.50 and as low as 1.20, with a median of 1.30.

Another notable valuation metric for EHC is its P/B ratio of 3.83. The P/B ratio pits a stock's market value against its book value, which is defined as total assets minus total liabilities. This stock's P/B looks attractive against its industry's average P/B of 4.25. Within the past 52 weeks, EHC's P/B has been as high as 3.94 and as low as 2.83, with a median of 3.43.

These are only a few of the key metrics included in Encompass Health's strong Value grade, but they help show that the stock is likely undervalued right now. When factoring in the strength of its earnings outlook, EHC looks like an impressive value stock at the moment.


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