Humana (HUM) Showing Signs Of Being Water-Logged And Getting Wetter
Trade-Ideas LLC identified
(
) as a "water-logged and getting wetter" (weak stocks crossing below support with today's range greater than 200%) candidate. In addition to specific proprietary factors, Trade-Ideas identified Humana as such a stock due to the following factors:
- HUM has an average dollar-volume (as measured by average daily share volume multiplied by share price) of $367.4 million.
- HUM has traded 1.1 million shares today.
- HUM traded in a range 251.9% of the normal price range with a price range of $12.07.
- HUM traded below its daily resistance level (quality: 48 days, meaning that the stock is crossing a resistance level set by the last 48 calendar days. The resistance price is defined by the Price - $0.01 at the time of the signal).
Stocks matching the 'Water-Logged and Getting Wetter' criteria are worthwhile stocks to watch for a variety of factors including historical back testing and volatility. Trade-Ideas targets these opportunities because the stock is exhibiting an unusual behavior while displaying negative price action. In this case, the stock crossed an important inflection point; namely, "support" while at the same time the range of the stock's movement in price is twice its normal size. This large range foreshadows a possible continuation as the stock moves lower.
EXCLUSIVE OFFER: Get the inside scoop on opportunities in HUM with the Ticky from Trade-Ideas. See the FREE profile for HUM NOW at Trade-Ideas
More details on HUM:
Humana Inc., together with its subsidiaries, operates as a health and well-being company. The company operates through three segments: Retail, Group, and Healthcare Services. The stock currently has a dividend yield of 0.7%. HUM has a PE ratio of 25. Currently there are 6 analysts that rate Humana a buy, no analysts rate it a sell, and 9 rate it a hold.
The average volume for Humana has been 1.2 million shares per day over the past 30 days. Humana has a market cap of $25.9 billion and is part of the health care sector and health services industry. The stock has a beta of 0.85 and a short float of 1.9% with 1.26 days to cover. Shares are up 0.8% year-to-date as of the close of trading on Wednesday.
EXCLUSIVE OFFER: See inside Jim Cramer's multi-million dollar charitable trust portfolio to see the stocks he thinks could be potential winners. Click here to see his holdings for 14-days FREE.
Analysis:
rates Humana as a
. The company's strengths can be seen in multiple areas, such as its largely solid financial position with reasonable debt levels by most measures and good cash flow from operations. We feel its strengths outweigh the fact that the company has had lackluster performance in the stock itself.
Highlights from the ratings report include:
- The current debt-to-equity ratio, 0.39, is low and is below the industry average, implying that there has been successful management of debt levels. Along with the favorable debt-to-equity ratio, the company maintains an adequate quick ratio of 1.21, which illustrates the ability to avoid short-term cash problems.
- Net operating cash flow has significantly increased by 350.46% to $482.00 million when compared to the same quarter last year. In addition, HUMANA INC has also vastly surpassed the industry average cash flow growth rate of 19.60%.
- HUMANA INC's earnings per share declined by 44.7% in the most recent quarter compared to the same quarter a year ago. This company has reported somewhat volatile earnings recently. But, we feel it is poised for EPS growth in the coming year. During the past fiscal year, HUMANA INC increased its bottom line by earning $8.43 versus $7.33 in the prior year. This year, the market expects an improvement in earnings ($8.85 versus $8.43).
- HUM, with its decline in revenue, slightly underperformed the industry average of 8.8%. Since the same quarter one year prior, revenues slightly dropped by 0.2%. Weakness in the company's revenue seems to have hurt the bottom line, decreasing earnings per share.
- The share price of HUMANA INC has not done very well: it is down 5.96% and has underperformed the S&P 500, in part reflecting the company's sharply declining earnings per share when compared to the year-earlier quarter. Despite the stock's decline during the last year, it is still somewhat more expensive (in proportion to its earnings over the last year) than most other stocks in its industry. We feel, however, that other strengths this company displays offset this slight negative.
- You can view the full Humana Ratings Report.
EXCLUSIVE OFFER: See inside Jim Cramer's multi-million dollar charitable trust portfolio to see the stocks he thinks could be potential winners. Click here to see his holdings for 14-days FREE.