Investors interested in Finance stocks should always be looking to find the best-performing companies in the group. Is Ameris Bancorp (ABCB) one of those stocks right now? Let's take a closer look at the stock's year-to-date performance to find out.
Ameris Bancorp is one of 833 companies in the Finance group. The Finance group currently sits at #6 within the Zacks Sector Rank. The Zacks Sector Rank considers 16 different groups, measuring the average Zacks Rank of the individual stocks within the sector to gauge the strength of each group.
The Zacks Rank emphasizes earnings estimates and estimate revisions to find stocks with improving earnings outlooks. This system has a long record of success, and these stocks tend to be on track to beat the market over the next one to three months. Ameris Bancorp is currently sporting a Zacks Rank of #2 (Buy).
Over the past three months, the Zacks Consensus Estimate for ABCB's full-year earnings has moved 3.5% higher. This is a sign of improving analyst sentiment and a positive earnings outlook trend.
Based on the most recent data, ABCB has returned 15.4% so far this year. Meanwhile, the Finance sector has returned an average of 1.4% on a year-to-date basis. This shows that Ameris Bancorp is outperforming its peers so far this year.
Another Finance stock, which has outperformed the sector so far this year, is Bread Financial Holdings (BFH). The stock has returned 19.6% year-to-date.
Over the past three months, Bread Financial Holdings' consensus EPS estimate for the current year has increased 13.7%. The stock currently has a Zacks Rank #1 (Strong Buy).
Breaking things down more, Ameris Bancorp is a member of the Banks - Southeast industry, which includes 53 individual companies and currently sits at #76 in the Zacks Industry Rank. On average, stocks in this group have gained 5.4% this year, meaning that ABCB is performing better in terms of year-to-date returns.
In contrast, Bread Financial Holdings falls under the Financial - Miscellaneous Services industry. Currently, this industry has 107 stocks and is ranked #101. Since the beginning of the year, the industry has moved -6.9%.
Going forward, investors interested in Finance stocks should continue to pay close attention to Ameris Bancorp and Bread Financial Holdings as they could maintain their solid performance.
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This article originally published on Zacks Investment Research (zacks.com).