Dow Today: American Express (AXP) Higher

The Dow Jones Industrial Average (^DJI) is trading up 23 points (+0.2%) at 12,906 as of Thursday, Feb 9, 2012, 1:39 p.m. ET. During this time, 673.5 million shares of the 30 Dow components have changed hands vs. an average daily trading volume of 818.6 million. The NYSE advances/declines ratio sits at 1,542 issues advancing vs. 1,399 declining with 141 unchanged.

The Dow component leading the way higher looks to be American Express (NYSE:AXP), which is sporting a 64-cent gain (+1.2%) bringing the stock to $52.28. This single gain is lifting the Dow Jones Industrial Average by 4.84 points or roughly accounting for 21% of the Dow's overall gain. Volume for American Express currently sits at 4.7 million shares traded vs. an average daily trading volume of 6.5 million shares.

American Express has a market cap of $57.18 billion and is part of the financial sector and financial services industry. Shares are up 9.5% year to date as of Wednesday's close. The stock's dividend yield sits at 1.4%.

American Express Company, together with its subsidiaries, provides charge and credit payment card products, and travel-related services worldwide. The company has a P/E ratio of 12.7, above the average financial services industry P/E ratio of 11.9 and below the S&P 500 P/E ratio of 17.7.

TheStreet Ratings rates American Express as a buy. The company's strengths can be seen in multiple areas, such as its revenue growth, notable return on equity, growth in earnings per share, increase in net income and solid stock price performance. We feel these strengths outweigh the fact that the company has had generally poor debt management on most measures that we evaluated.

• You can view the full American Express Ratings Report.

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