Why Fast-Paced Mover Shoe Carnival Is a Great Choice for Value Investors

Momentum investing is essentially the opposite of the tried-and-tested Wall Street adage -- "buy low and sell high." Investors following this investing style typically avoid betting on cheap stocks and waiting long for them to recover. They believe instead that one could make far more money in lesser time by "buying high and selling higher."

Everyone likes betting on fast-moving trending stocks, but it isn't easy to determine the right entry point. These stocks often lose momentum when their future growth potential fails to justify their swelled-up valuation. In that phase, investors find themselves invested in shares that have limited to no upside or even a downside. So, betting on a stock just by looking at the traditional momentum parameters could be risky at times.

A safer approach could be investing in bargain stocks with recent price momentum. While the Zacks Momentum Style Score helps identify great momentum stocks by paying close attention to trends in a stock's price or earnings, our 'Fast-Paced Momentum at a Bargain' screen comes handy in spotting fast-moving stocks that are still attractively priced.

There are several stocks that currently pass through the screen and Shoe Carnival SCVL is one of them. Here are the key reasons why this stock is a great candidate.

Investors' growing interest in a stock is reflected in its recent price increase. A price change of 0.5% over the past four weeks positions the stock of this footwear retailer well in this regard.

While any stock can see a spike in price for a short period, it takes a real momentum player to deliver positive returns for a longer time frame. SCVL meets this criterion too, as the stock gained 9.9% over the past 12 weeks.

Moreover, the momentum for SCVL is fast paced, as the stock currently has a beta of 1.53. This indicates that the stock moves 53% higher than the market in either direction.

Given this price performance, it is no surprise that SCVL has a Momentum Score of B, which indicates that this is the right time to enter the stock to take advantage of the momentum with the highest probability of success.

In addition to a favorable Momentum Score, an upward trend in earnings estimate revisions has helped SCVL earn a Zacks Rank #2 (Buy). Our research shows that the momentum-effect is quite strong among Zacks Rank #1 and #2 stocks. That's because as covering analysts raise their earnings estimates for a stock, more and more investors take an interest in it, helping its price race to keep up.

Most importantly, despite possessing fast-paced momentum features, SCVL is trading at a reasonable valuation. In terms of Price-to-Sales ratio, which is considered as one of the best valuation metrics, the stock looks quite cheap now. SCVL is currently trading at 0.89 times its sales. In other words, investors need to pay only 89 cents for each dollar of sales.

So, SCVL appears to have plenty of room to run, and that too at a fast pace.

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