For those looking to find strong Finance stocks, it is prudent to search for companies in the group that are outperforming their peers. Has Cadence (CADE) been one of those stocks this year? Let's take a closer look at the stock's year-to-date performance to find out.

Cadence is one of 871 individual stocks in the Finance sector. Collectively, these companies sit at #1 in the Zacks Sector Rank. The Zacks Sector Rank gauges the strength of our 16 individual sector groups by measuring the average Zacks Rank of the individual stocks within the groups.

The Zacks Rank emphasizes earnings estimates and estimate revisions to find stocks with improving earnings outlooks. This system has a long record of success, and these stocks tend to be on track to beat the market over the next one to three months. Cadence is currently sporting a Zacks Rank of #2 (Buy).

Over the past three months, the Zacks Consensus Estimate for CADE's full-year earnings has moved 6% higher. This shows that analyst sentiment has improved and the company's earnings outlook is stronger.

Based on the most recent data, CADE has returned 29.5% so far this year. Meanwhile, the Finance sector has returned an average of 25.6% on a year-to-date basis. This means that Cadence is performing better than its sector in terms of year-to-date returns.

One other Finance stock that has outperformed the sector so far this year is COPT Defense (CDP). The stock is up 28.1% year-to-date.

The consensus estimate for COPT Defense's current year EPS has increased 0.2% over the past three months. The stock currently has a Zacks Rank #2 (Buy).

To break things down more, Cadence belongs to the Banks - Southeast industry, a group that includes 55 individual companies and currently sits at #47 in the Zacks Industry Rank. On average, this group has gained an average of 32.3% so far this year, meaning that CADE is slightly underperforming its industry in terms of year-to-date returns.

In contrast, COPT Defense falls under the REIT and Equity Trust - Other industry. Currently, this industry has 96 stocks and is ranked #77. Since the beginning of the year, the industry has moved +7.4%.

Going forward, investors interested in Finance stocks should continue to pay close attention to Cadence and COPT Defense as they could maintain their solid performance.

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