Investors interested in Banks - Foreign stocks are likely familiar with Woori Bank (WF) and National Australia Bank Ltd. (NABZY). But which of these two stocks is more attractive to value investors? We'll need to take a closer look to find out.

There are plenty of strategies for discovering value stocks, but we have found that pairing a strong Zacks Rank with an impressive grade in the Value category of our Style Scores system produces the best returns. The Zacks Rank favors stocks with strong earnings estimate revision trends, and our Style Scores highlight companies with specific traits.

Woori Bank and National Australia Bank Ltd. are both sporting a Zacks Rank of #2 (Buy) right now. This system places an emphasis on companies that have seen positive earnings estimate revisions, so investors should feel comfortable knowing that these stocks have improving earnings outlooks. However, value investors will care about much more than just this.

Value investors are also interested in a number of tried-and-true valuation metrics that help show when a company is undervalued at its current share price levels.

Our Value category grades stocks based on a number of key metrics, including the tried-and-true P/E ratio, the P/S ratio, earnings yield, and cash flow per share, as well as a variety of other fundamentals that value investors frequently use.

WF currently has a forward P/E ratio of 6.93, while NABZY has a forward P/E of 17.91. We also note that WF has a PEG ratio of 0.70. This metric is used similarly to the famous P/E ratio, but the PEG ratio also takes into account the stock's expected earnings growth rate. NABZY currently has a PEG ratio of 3.39.

Another notable valuation metric for WF is its P/B ratio of 0.64. Investors use the P/B ratio to look at a stock's market value versus its book value, which is defined as total assets minus total liabilities. By comparison, NABZY has a P/B of 2.4.

These are just a few of the metrics contributing to WF's Value grade of A and NABZY's Value grade of D.

Both WF and NABZY are impressive stocks with solid earnings outlooks, but based on these valuation figures, we feel that WF is the superior value option right now.

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Woori Bank (WF):Free Stock Analysis Report

National Australia Bank Ltd. (NABZY):Free Stock Analysis Report

This article originally published on Zacks Investment Research (zacks.com).

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