By Nora Atcheson

June 1, 2021 - Alliance Resource Partners, L.P. (NASDAQ:ARLP) price closed lower on Friday, May 28, sinking -2.61% below its previous close.

A look at the daily price movement shows that the last close reads $6.12, with intraday deals fluctuated between $5.92 and $6.11. The company’s 5Y monthly beta was ticking 1.84 while its P/E ratio in the trailing 12-month period read 18.74. Taking into account the 52-week price action we note that the stock hit a 52-week high of $6.68 and 52-week low of $2.63. The stock added 3.65% on its value in the past month.

Alliance Resource Partners, L.P., which has a market valuation of $778.38 Million, is expected to release its quarterly earnings report Jul 26, 2021- Jul 30, 2021. The company stock has a Forward Dividend ratio of 0.1, while the dividend yield is 1.68. It is understandable that investor optimism is growing ahead of the company’s current quarter results. Analysts tracking ARLP have forecast the quarterly EPS to grow by $0.2 per share this quarter, while the same analysts predict the annual EPS to hit $0.8 for the year 2021 and up to $0.43 for 2022. In this case, analysts estimate an annual EPS growth of -1.78% for the year and -0.46% for the next year.

On average, analysts have forecast the company’s revenue for the quarter will hit $373.9 Million, with the likely lows of $372.7 Million and highs of $375.1 Million. The average estimate suggests sales growth for the quarter will likely rise by 70.7% when compared to those recorded in the same quarter in the last financial year. Staying with the analyst view, there is a consensus estimate of $1.45 Billion for the company’s annual revenue in 2021. Per this projection, the revenue is forecast to grow +9.1% above that which the company brought in 2020.

On the technical perspective front, indicators give ARLP a short term outlook of 50% Buy on average. Looking at the stock’s medium term indicators we note that it is averaging as a 100% Buy, while an average of long term indicators are currently assigning the stock as 100% Buy.

Here is a look at the average analyst rating for the stock as represented on a scale of 1.00 to 5.00, with the extremes of 1.00 and 5.00 suggesting the stock is strong buy or strong sell respectively. Specifically, 1 analysts have assigned ARLP a recommendation rating as follows: None rate it as a Hold; 1 advise Buy while none analyst(s) assign an Outperform rating. None analyst(s) have tagged the Alliance Resource Partners, L.P. (ARLP) stock as Underperform, with none recommending Sell. In general, analysts have rated the stock Buy, a scenario likely to bolster investors out for an opportunity to add to their holdings of the company’s shares.

If we dive deeper into the stock’s performance we see the positive picture represented by the PEG ratio, currently standing at 0. The overview shows that ARLP’s price is at present -0.58% off the SMA20 and 0.95% from the SMA50. The Relative Strength Index (RSI) metric on the 14-day timeframe is pointing at 48.78, with weekly volatility standing at 3.71%. The indicator jumps to 4.6% when calculated based on the past 30 days. Alliance Resource Partners, L.P. (NASDAQ:ARLP)’s beta value is holding at 1.84, while the average true range (ATR) indicator is currently reading 0.29. Considering analysts have assigned the stock a price target range of $7-$7 as the low and high respectively, we find the trailing 12-month average consensus price target to be $7. Based on this estimate, we see that current price is roughly 17.45% off the estimated low and 17.45% off the forecast high. Investors will no doubt be excited to see the share price rise to $7, which is the median consensus price, and at that level ARLP would be +17.45% from current price.

Turning out attention to how the Alliance Resource Partners, L.P. stock has performed in comparison to its peers in the industry, here’s what we find: ARLP’s stock is -2.61% on the day and +88.01% in the past 12 months, while Warrior Met Coal Inc (HCC) traded -4.34% in the last session and was positioned +29.97% up on its price 12 months ago. Another comparison is with Peabody Energy Corp (BTU) whose stock price was up 2.31% in the last trading session, and has flourished +110.48% over the past year. Also, Suncoke Energy Inc (SXC) showed downtrend of -2.61% while its price kept floating at 88.01% over the past year. As for Alliance Resource Partners, L.P., the P/E ratio stands at 18.74 higher than that of Warrior Met Coal Inc’s at 0 and Peabody Energy Corp’s 0. Elsewhere in the market, the S&P 500 Index has rallied 0.08% in last trading session, with the Dow Jones Industrial also saw a positive session on the day with +0.19%.

An analysis of the Alliance Resource Partners, L.P. (NASDAQ:ARLP) stock in terms of its daily trading volume indicates that the 3-month average is 488.37 Million. However, this figure declines on the past 10-day timeline to an average of 283.22 Million.

Current records show that the company has 127.19 Million in outstanding shares. According to data from Thomson Reuters, insiders’ percentage holdings are 31.62% of outstanding shares while the percentage share held by institutions stands at 19.1%. The stats also highlight that short interest as of May 13, 2021, stood at 1.92 Million shares, which puts the short ratio at the time at 3.08. From this we can glean that short interest is 1.51% of company’s current outstanding shares. Notably, we see that shares short in May rose slightly given the previous month’s figure stood at 1.26 Million. But the +33.04% upside, the stock’s price has registered year-to-date as of last trading, will likely reignite investor interest given the prospect of it rallying even higher.