Is New Oriental Education & Technology Group (EDU) Outperforming Other Consumer Discretionary Stocks This Year?

Core Viewpoint - New Oriental Education (EDU) has shown strong performance in the Consumer Discretionary sector, outperforming its peers significantly in year-to-date returns [1][4]. Company Performance - New Oriental Education has a Zacks Rank of 1 (Strong Buy), indicating a favorable outlook based on earnings estimate revisions [3]. - The Zacks Consensus Estimate for EDU's full-year earnings has increased by 5.6% in the past quarter, reflecting improved analyst sentiment [4]. - Year-to-date, EDU has returned 15.4%, while the average return for Consumer Discretionary stocks has been a loss of 5.2%, showcasing its superior performance [4]. Industry Context - New Oriental Education is part of the Schools industry, which consists of 17 stocks and currently ranks 84 in the Zacks Industry Rank [6]. - The average return for stocks in the Schools industry has been 5.9% this year, indicating that EDU is performing better than the industry average [6]. - In comparison, another stock in the Consumer Discretionary sector, Sleep Number (SNBR), has a year-to-date return of 39.6% and a Zacks Rank of 2 (Buy) [5].