For those looking to find strong Industrial Products stocks, it is prudent to search for companies in the group that are outperforming their peers. Is Applied Industrial Technologies (AIT) one of those stocks right now? Let's take a closer look at the stock's year-to-date performance to find out.
Applied Industrial Technologies is a member of our Industrial Products group, which includes 188 different companies and currently sits at #9 in the Zacks Sector Rank. The Zacks Sector Rank gauges the strength of our 16 individual sector groups by measuring the average Zacks Rank of the individual stocks within the groups.
The Zacks Rank is a proven system that emphasizes earnings estimates and estimate revisions, highlighting a variety of stocks that are displaying the right characteristics to beat the market over the next one to three months. Applied Industrial Technologies is currently sporting a Zacks Rank of #2 (Buy).
The Zacks Consensus Estimate for AIT's full-year earnings has moved 1.2% higher within the past quarter. This is a sign of improving analyst sentiment and a positive earnings outlook trend.
Our latest available data shows that AIT has returned about 27.6% since the start of the calendar year. Meanwhile, the Industrial Products sector has returned an average of 17.2% on a year-to-date basis. This shows that Applied Industrial Technologies is outperforming its peers so far this year.
Another Industrial Products stock, which has outperformed the sector so far this year, is W.W. Grainger (GWW). The stock has returned 35.9% year-to-date.
Over the past three months, W.W. Grainger's consensus EPS estimate for the current year has increased 4.2%. The stock currently has a Zacks Rank #2 (Buy).
Looking more specifically, Applied Industrial Technologies belongs to the Manufacturing - General Industrial industry, which includes 42 individual stocks and currently sits at #66 in the Zacks Industry Rank. Stocks in this group have gained about 6.7% so far this year, so AIT is performing better this group in terms of year-to-date returns.
In contrast, W.W. Grainger falls under the Industrial Services industry. Currently, this industry has 17 stocks and is ranked #203. Since the beginning of the year, the industry has moved +9.1%.
Going forward, investors interested in Industrial Products stocks should continue to pay close attention to Applied Industrial Technologies and W.W. Grainger as they could maintain their solid performance.
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Applied Industrial Technologies, Inc. (AIT): Free Stock Analysis Report
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This article originally published on Zacks Investment Research (zacks.com).