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Citigroup (C) Rises But Trails Market: What Investors Should Know

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In the latest trading session, Citigroup (C - Free Report) closed at $69, marking a +0.35% move from the previous day. The stock trailed the S&P 500, which registered a daily gain of 0.39%. Elsewhere, the Dow lost 0.13%, while the tech-heavy Nasdaq added 0.6%.

Prior to today's trading, shares of the U.S. bank had gained 9.4% over the past month. This has outpaced the Finance sector's gain of 3.06% and the S&P 500's gain of 1.06% in that time.

Market participants will be closely following the financial results of Citigroup in its upcoming release. It is anticipated that the company will report an EPS of $1.20, marking a 42.86% rise compared to the same quarter of the previous year. Simultaneously, our latest consensus estimate expects the revenue to be $19.46 billion, showing a 11.57% escalation compared to the year-ago quarter.

For the entire fiscal year, the Zacks Consensus Estimates are projecting earnings of $5.85 per share and a revenue of $80.92 billion, representing changes of -3.15% and +3.13%, respectively, from the prior year.

Investors should also take note of any recent adjustments to analyst estimates for Citigroup. Recent revisions tend to reflect the latest near-term business trends. Hence, positive alterations in estimates signify analyst optimism regarding the company's business and profitability.

Our research shows that these estimate changes are directly correlated with near-term stock prices. To benefit from this, we have developed the Zacks Rank, a proprietary model which takes these estimate changes into account and provides an actionable rating system.

The Zacks Rank system, running from #1 (Strong Buy) to #5 (Strong Sell), holds an admirable track record of superior performance, independently audited, with #1 stocks contributing an average annual return of +25% since 1988. Over the last 30 days, the Zacks Consensus EPS estimate has moved 0.32% lower. Citigroup is currently a Zacks Rank #3 (Hold).

Looking at valuation, Citigroup is presently trading at a Forward P/E ratio of 11.75. This expresses a discount compared to the average Forward P/E of 17.01 of its industry.

It is also worth noting that C currently has a PEG ratio of 0.77. The PEG ratio is akin to the commonly utilized P/E ratio, but this measure also incorporates the company's anticipated earnings growth rate. As the market closed yesterday, the Financial - Investment Bank industry was having an average PEG ratio of 1.48.

The Financial - Investment Bank industry is part of the Finance sector. This group has a Zacks Industry Rank of 47, putting it in the top 19% of all 250+ industries.

The Zacks Industry Rank gauges the strength of our individual industry groups by measuring the average Zacks Rank of the individual stocks within the groups. Our research shows that the top 50% rated industries outperform the bottom half by a factor of 2 to 1.

Be sure to use Zacks.com to monitor all these stock-influencing metrics, and more, throughout the forthcoming trading sessions.


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