Don't Buy Southern Company Before Checking Its Fundamentals!

By Scott Lee • Sunday, April 16 16:45 • Permanent Link

More and more people are talking about Southern Company over the last few weeks. Is it worth buying the Utilities—Independent Power Producers stock at a price of $71.94? Only time will tell. The information below will give you a basic idea of what this investment may entail:

Southern Company has moved -5.1% over the last year, and the S&P 500 logged a change of -5.8%
SO has an average analyst rating of hold and is 1.54% away from its mean target price of $70.85 per share
Its trailing earnings per share (EPS) is $3.26
Southern Company has a trailing 12 month Price to Earnings (P/E) ratio of 22.1 while the S&P 500 average is 15.97
Its forward earnings per share (EPS) is $4.03 and its forward P/E ratio is 17.9
The company has a Price to Book (P/B) ratio of 2.6 in contrast to the S&P 500's average ratio of 2.95
Southern Company is part of the Utilities sector, which has an average P/E ratio of 22.89 and an average P/B of 1.03
The company has a free cash flow of $-1,140,125,056.00, which refers to the total sum of all its inflows and outflows of cash over the last quarter
The Southern Company, through its subsidiaries, engages in the generation, transmission, and distribution of electricity. It operates through three segments: Gas Distribution Operations, Gas Pipeline Investments, and Gas Marketing Services. The company also develops, constructs, acquires, owns, and manages power generation assets, including renewable energy projects and sells electricity in the wholesale market; and distributes natural gas in Illinois, Georgia, Virginia, and Tennessee, as well as provides gas marketing services, gas distribution operations, and gas pipeline investments operations. In addition, it constructs, operates, and maintains 77,591 miles of natural gas pipelines and 14 storage facilities with total capacity of 157 Bcf to provide natural gas to residential, commercial, and industrial customers. The company serves approximately 8.8 million electric and gas utility customers. Further, the company offers digital wireless communications and fiber optics services. The Southern Company was incorporated in 1945 and is headquartered in Atlanta, Georgia.

The above analysis is intended for educational purposes only and was performed on the basis of publicly available data. It is not to be construed as a recommendation to buy or sell any security. Any buy, sell, or other recommendations mentioned in the article are direct quotations of consensus recommendations from the analysts covering the stock, and do not represent the opinions of Market Inference or its writers. Past performance, accounting data, and inferences about market position and corporate valuation are not reliable indicators of future price movements. Market Inference does not provide financial advice. Investors should conduct their own review and analysis of any company of interest before making an investment decision.