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Should Value Investors Buy Marubeni (MARUY) Stock?

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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.

Considering these trends, value investing is clearly one of the most preferred ways to find strong stocks in any type of market. Value investors use tried-and-true metrics and fundamental analysis to find companies that they believe are undervalued at their current share price levels.

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 to watch right now is Marubeni (MARUY - Free Report) . MARUY is currently sporting a Zacks Rank #1 (Strong Buy), as well as a Value grade of A. The stock is trading with P/E ratio of 10.67 right now. For comparison, its industry sports an average P/E of 16.26. MARUY's Forward P/E has been as high as 11.91 and as low as 7.00, with a median of 8.06, all within the past year.

Value investors also frequently use the P/S ratio. This metric is found by dividing a stock's price with the company's revenue. Some people prefer this metric because sales are harder to manipulate on an income statement. This means it could be a truer performance indicator. MARUY has a P/S ratio of 0.64. This compares to its industry's average P/S of 1.04.

Finally, our model also underscores that MARUY has a P/CF ratio of 7.46. This figure highlights a company's operating cash flow and can be used to find firms that are undervalued when considering their impressive cash outlook. This stock's P/CF looks attractive against its industry's average P/CF of 15.54. Over the past year, MARUY's P/CF has been as high as 7.58 and as low as 4.91, with a median of 6.03.

Investors could also keep in mind Mitsubishi (MSBHF - Free Report) , another Diversified Operations stock with a Zacks Rank of #1 (Strong Buy) and Value grade of A.

Mitsubishi sports a P/B ratio of 1.17 as well; this compares to its industry's price-to-book ratio of 6.72. In the past 52 weeks, MSBHF's P/B has been as high as 1.28, as low as 0.59, with a median of 1.04.

Value investors will likely look at more than just these metrics, but the above data helps show that Marubeni and Mitsubishi are likely undervalued currently. And when considering the strength of its earnings outlook, MARUY and MSBHF sticks out as one of the market's strongest value stocks.


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