Zacks.com featured highlights include StoneCo, USANA Health, Strategic Education, Nexa Resources and CVS

Zacks highlights five low price-to-book stocks for June: StoneCo (STNE), USANA Health Sciences (USNA), Strategic Education (STRA), Nexa Resources (NEXA) and CVS Health (CVS). Each is presented with a Value Score of A and projected 3-5-year EPS growth ranging from 12.0% to 23.6%, with NEXA carrying Zacks Rank #1 and the others mostly Rank #2. The piece is primarily valuation-oriented commentary rather than a new company-specific catalyst, so near-term price impact should be limited.

Analysis

The screen is less a pure value signal than a balance-sheet quality filter on businesses where net assets still matter: a mix of regulated cash generators, asset-heavy industrials, and a fintech with latent operating leverage. The immediate second-order effect is relative rather than absolute: if the market starts rewarding P/B more broadly, capital can rotate away from expensive duration names into earnings-recovery stories where modest multiple re-rating can compound with modest EPS growth. That makes the setup more interesting for the lower-beta, cash-flowing names than for the higher-growth fintech, where the market will likely keep demanding proof of margin durability before awarding a true value premium.

The main contrarian miss is that “cheap on book” can be a trap unless the assets are productive or the business is in a self-help phase. CVS looks most interesting from that lens because healthcare distribution and pharmacy networks often get mispriced when investors focus on headline reimbursement pressure instead of capital intensity and buyback power; if management can stabilize incremental margins, even a small P/B rerate can be powerful over 6-12 months. STRA has a similar structure but higher policy risk: any improvement in enrollment mix or operating leverage can surprise to the upside, while regulatory or student-demand weakness can reverse the move quickly.

STNE is the cleanest asymmetric story because fintech tends to be valued on growth until credit/merchant risk or take-rate compression shows up; a low P/B screen suggests the market is still discounting asset quality and cyclicality, so a few quarters of stable loss ratios could trigger a sharp multiple reset. NEXA is the most cyclical and thus the most “option-like”: if base metals stay firm, book value screens often underestimate how quickly earnings and cash generation can outpace stated equity, but a turn lower in industrial demand can make book value look optically cheap right before it erodes. USNA is the weakest follow-through candidate in this basket because low P/B there likely reflects a slower-growth consumer health franchise where the rerating ceiling is capped unless revenue inflects.

Key Decisions for Investors

• Long CVS vs. short a high-multiple healthcare services peer basket for 3-6 months; thesis is that capital discipline and buyback support will matter more than near-term narrative drift, with better downside protection if the sector de-risks.
• Buy STRA on weakness only if enrollment/margin commentary remains stable over the next earnings cycle; use a 6-12 month horizon and keep position size modest because policy sensitivity can cut the thesis in half quickly.
• Trade STNE as a catalyst-driven long versus a fintech short basket over 1-2 quarters; target a rerating if credit metrics stay clean, but hard-stop on any deterioration in merchant delinquency or take-rate compression.
• Treat NEXA as a tactical cyclical long, not a core position; enter only on improving metals tape and exit on evidence of China-linked demand weakness, since the book-value argument will break fastest in a down-cycle.
• Avoid chasing USNA as a standalone value idea; if long at all, use it only as a small basket component paired against a stronger consumer staple, since cheapness here is more likely to be structurally justified than mispriced.