La-Z-Boy stock is down 10.5% in 2021
La-Z-Boy Incorporated (NYSE:LZB) is one of the largest manufacturers and marketers of residential furniture. LZB's portfolio of wholesale brands includes England, La-Z-Boy, American Drew, Hammary, and Kincaid. La-Z-Boy's company-owned retail segment includes 159 of the 354 La-Z-Boy Furniture Galleries stores. LZB also owns Joybird, an e-commerce retailer and manufacturer of upholstered furniture.
La-Z-Boy stock is up 12% year-over-year, with its second-quarter selloff finding its legs near the $32.50 level in late June. Since then, LZB has been in rally mode, though its been contending with the 320-day moving average during the past couple sessions. The equity has managed to find support at the 10-day moving average one more, though it's still looking at a year-to-date deficit of roughly 10.5%. The furniture company also offers shareholders a forward dividend of $0.60 and a dividend yield 1.67%.
On August 3, La-Z-Boy announced that its first quarter of fiscal 2022 financial results will be released after market closes on Tuesday, Aug. 17. La-Z-Boy will also hold its quarterly investor conference call the following day, Wednesday, Aug. 18.
At the earnings confessional over the past year, La-Z-Boy has outperformed Wall Street's earnings expectations on all four of the most recent quarterly reports. For Q1 of fiscal 2021, LZB beat estimates by a margin of $0.31, reporting an earnings per share (EPS) of $0.18. For Q2 of fiscal 2021, La-Z-Boy's EPS increased to $0.82 and beat expectations by a margin of $0.32. For Q3 of fiscal 2021, earnings dropped to $0.74 per share but the furniture brand still beat estimates by a margin of $0.04. For Q4 of 2021, La-Z-Boy reported an EPS of $0.87 and beat expectations by a margin of $0.13. LZB is expected to report an EPS of $0.57 for Q1 of fiscal 2022 on Tuesday.
Fundamentally, La-Z-Boy stock has a price-earnings ratio of 15.66, which is a fair valuation given LZB's growth rate. The furniture company has grown revenues by 9.5% and net income by 32.3% since fiscal 2018. In addition, La-Z-Boy has a solid balance sheet with $391.21 million in cash and $362.64 million in total debt. Overall, LZB will likely yield minimal returns in the long-term, but the stock does offer a high level of security for passive investors looking for safe opportunities.