Genuine Parts Company (GPC): Why Is This Auto Parts Company the Best For Your Portfolio?

Advance Auto Parts is about half the size of the others in terms of market cap, and operates about 4,000 retail stores. Advance Auto Parts, Inc. (NYSE:AAP) trades for the lowest P/E of the three at just 15.5 times TTM earnings, and has a projected 10% forward growth rate. While the company does pay a dividend, it is not very significant at just 0.29% annually. However, Advance Auto Parts does have a very strong balance sheet with virtually no net debt.

Buy, Sell, or Hold?

While the other two don’t look expensive by any means, I simply like Genuine Parts Company (NYSE:GPC) much better due to its high, steadily rising yield, great balance sheet, and perhaps most importantly, the diversification of its business. While it is hard to go wrong with any of these three as long as the economy continues to improve, Genuine Parts seems the best equipped to weather the bad times as well, making it my favorite of the group.

The article Why Is This Auto Parts Company the Best For Your Portfolio? originally appeared on Fool.com and is written by Matthew Franke.

Matthew Frankel has no position in any stocks mentioned. The Motley Fool has no position in any of the stocks mentioned. Matthew is a member of The Motley Fool Blog Network — entries represent the personal opinion of the blogger and are not formally edited.

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