Investment "Logic"

On October 2, Pepsico announced their third quarter earnings results while saying goodbye to their CEO.  This was the last day and last earnings call to be led by Indra Nooyi, a venerable champion in the business with her strong leadership pointed towards a strong future for the company by making sure they stayed in front of and fully involved in snack and beverage trends.  I'll get more into the company's future as I close this up, though.  As for the earnings results themselves, the company generated non-GAAP earnings of $1.59 which beat consensus by two cents and delivered organic revenue growth of 4.9%.  Core constant currency growth was 9%.  This included a 2% impact from currency conversion, given the recent strength of the US Dollar.  They also guided up on their expectation for organic growth from less than 3% to at least 3%, a sign of confidence that their final quarter looks bright.   While profit was down for the North American Be...

Back on April 30 (yeah, I'm way behind), Pepsico announced their first quarter financial earnings for 2018.  Earnings came in at $0.96, beating consensus by three cents and sales were $12.56B also ahead of analyst expectations of $12.35B.  Finally, organic growth came in line with company guidance at 2.3%.  In all, the quarter was solid.  Maybe not perfect, but definitely solid. As has been the case for a couple quarters already, North American Beverages (NAB) under performed the overall company.  There were operating and raw material inflation costs as well as some one-time bonus impacts.  That said, NAB did improve performance quarter over quarter for the third quarter in a row.  Guidance has been that this is the path they're on and that it will continue, so I see that as a positive at this point.  There are worries among the analyst community about competition and pricing wars, particularly in the sports drink section, but management see...

Today I increased my position in Pepsico by 25% at a price of $97.25.  While I haven't had a chance to complete my homework and post my review on the company's first quarter results, I do know the company beat expectations and provided a solid set of results for the quarter.  The one thing that I noted to like, in particular, was the fact that North American Beverages (NAB) didn't do as bad as analysts expected.  While there is some concern on all of the China and Tariff talks impacting the stock and the fact that the company is seeing more competition against the 10-year treasury, we've now seen the stock drop roughly 21% from its 52 week highs.  This selloff is getting to be over done and any good news could sent the stock higher.  If the stock drops to $92.75 we'll see the stock yielding 4% and that's far from typical for this consistent player.  I do have more room in my position and cash levels to take advantage of more down side - and I do see pot...

Oh how the times change so easily.  It's become apparent that the stock market of 2017 is gone and what has taken its place is one filled with uncertainty and volatility.  Repeatedly over the last number of weeks we face wild swings as our President tweets, aids calm fears, and new complications arise.  It's important to note that for the last month and a half, we've truly been in the grips of a macro environment where everything from Presidential Tweets, Fed statements, Jobs reports, and other extraneous political and macroeconomic news controls the markets.  The one thing that could potentially put some calm to the market - earnings season - only started on Friday and despite what was a strong showing out of our biggest banks, what started as strong gains were wiped out and met with losses as people got prepared for a weekend which included fears of us dropping missiles on Syria (it happened Friday night and then called a "complete success"), as well as fea...

Once again, it's been awhile since I've provided an update or completed missing quarterly reviews.  Time to put in some extra work and get caught up.  To start out with, my portfolio has been under performing the S&P 500 this year.  As of today, I'm just over 2% behind the S&P 500.  I'm finding this to be quite frustrating and am trying to figure out what/how/why that is the case after last year's over performance.  I have yet to figure out the solution, as many of these companies are still just as great as they always have been, but they've been out of favor in the market for the last couple months.  This is potentially a temporary thing and a test to my conviction in the holdings. That said, there are other factors to consider as well.  The US Dollar has leveled off and shown a little strength with the rise of interest rates and lack of similar actions in other reasons, for example.  And to top that off, Trump just elected Larry K...

Pepsico announced their fourth quarter and fiscal 2017 year end results back on February 13.  Headline results showed a slight beat of expectations with earnings coming inline with expectations at $1.31 and sales beating expectations of $19.38B with results of $19.53B.  The company was able to return organic growth back to anticipated levels of 2.3%, most North American segments grew and took share, and the international segments saw growth of mid single digits or higher.  The down side continues to be in the North American Beverages division.  It's true that they were able to see growth quarter over quarter, which was nice to see - especially after the product placement issues last quarter.  However, the growth is still not where expected or desired with an economy in its current state.  Pepsi is now about to introduce a new fizzy water called Bubly, which they hope will help bring some life back.  Personally speaking, they brought this on much to...

New year and it's time to get going on new weekly updates and a new batch of quarterly earnings reports.  Now that I've got the past year's review behind me, now it's time to start listening to fourth quarter and 2017 yearly earnings results.  We start on Tuesday when Citigroup announces their fourth quarter results.  Today, JP Morgan and Wells Fargo both reported.  There were significant tax losses and the trading divisions suffered because of low volatility.  There were also a fair amount of one-time charges,  which were expected to take advantage of tax loss benefits and other similar related events.  In general, the report was good for an institutional bank. NIM was higher and the forward outlook was postie, and with it, the bank stocks took off.  The markets will be closed on Monday for Martin Luther King Day, so Citi will be the next big bank report and I expect that we'll get another similar report and stock price results.  More s...