Is Ameren (AEE) Stock Outpacing Its Utilities Peers This Year?

Investors interested in Utilities stocks should always be looking to find the best-performing companies in the group. Ameren (AEE) is a stock that can certainly grab the attention of many investors, but do its recent returns compare favorably to the sector as a whole? A quick glance at the company's year-to-date performance in comparison to the rest of the Utilities sector should help us answer this question.Ameren is one of 110 companies in the Utilities group. The Utilities group currently sits at #7 within the Zacks Sector Rank. The Zacks Sector Rank includes 16 different groups and is listed in order from best to worst in terms of the average Zacks Rank of the individual companies within each of these sectors.The Zacks Rank is a successful stock-picking model that emphasizes earnings estimates and estimate revisions. The system highlights a number of different stocks that could be poised to outperform the broader market over the next one to three months. Ameren is currently sporting a Zacks Rank of #2 (Buy).Over the past 90 days, the Zacks Consensus Estimate for AEE's full-year earnings has moved 1.2% higher. This signals that analyst sentiment is improving and the stock's earnings outlook is more positive.According to our latest data, AEE has moved about 14.8% on a year-to-date basis. Meanwhile, the Utilities sector has returned an average of 8.6% on a year-to-date basis. This means that Ameren is performing better than its sector in terms of year-to-date returns.American Electric Power (AEP) is another Utilities stock that has outperformed the sector so far this year. Since the beginning of the year, the stock has returned 19.7%.Over the past three months, American Electric Power's consensus EPS estimate for the current year has increased 0.4%. The stock currently has a Zacks Rank #2 (Buy).Breaking things down more, Ameren is a member of the Utility - Electric Power industry, which includes 60 individual companies and currently sits at #80 in the Zacks Industry Rank. This group has gained an average of 10.1% so far this year, so AEE is performing better in this area. American Electric Power is also part of the same industry.Ameren and American Electric Power could continue their solid performance, so investors interested in Utilities stocks should continue to pay close attention to these stocks.Radical New Technology Could Hand Investors Huge GainsQuantum Computing is the next technological revolution, and it could be even more advanced than AI.While some believed the technology was years away, it is already present and moving fast. Large hyperscalers, such as Microsoft, Google, Amazon, Oracle, and even Meta and Tesla, are scrambling to integrate quantum computing into their infrastructure.Senior Stock Strategist Kevin Cook reveals 7 carefully selected stocks poised to dominate the quantum computing landscape in his report, Beyond AI: The Quantum Leap in Computing Power.Kevin was among the early experts who recognized NVIDIA's enormous potential back in 2016. Now, he has keyed in on what could be "the next big thing" in quantum computing supremacy. Today, you have a rare chance to position your portfolio at the forefront of this opportunity.See Top Quantum Stocks Now >>This article originally published on Zacks Investment Research (zacks.com).Zacks Investment ResearchWeiter zum vollständigen Artikel bei Zacks Weiter zum vollständigen Artikel bei Zacks