Second-quarter earnings season was a bit of a bust. Although earnings remain at an all-time high, the pace of earnings growth continues to look weak. Earnings growth is up just 3% from last year, a small improvement from the first quarter's 2.6% gain and the 2.8% average for the past four quarters.
The headlines reflected that disappointment, with stories about the biggest blue chips struggling with the weak global economy and falling short of expectations. That includes misses from bellwethers like IBM (NYSE: IBM), Google (Nasdaq: GOOG) and Microsoft (Nasdaq: MSFT).
But in spite of some earnings headwinds, there were a number of companies that bucked the trend and delivered big earnings surprises. For instance, take Facebook (Nasdaq: FB), which delivered a 44% earnings surprise last month that sent the company's share price soaring.
Hot Energy Companies To Own In Right Now: Colgate-Palmolive Company(CL)
Colgate-Palmolive Company, together with its subsidiaries, manufactures and markets consumer products worldwide. It offers oral care products, including toothpaste, toothbrushes, and mouth rinses, as well as dental floss and pharmaceutical products for dentists and other oral health professionals; personal care products, such as liquid hand soap, shower gels, bar soaps, deodorants, antiperspirants, shampoos, and conditioners; and home care products comprising laundry and dishwashing detergents, fabric conditioners, household cleaners, bleaches, dishwashing liquids, and oil soaps. The company offers its oral, personal, and home care products under the Colgate Total, Colgate Max Fresh, Colgate 360 Advisors' Opinion:
- [By Kashafa Investment Research]
What works in P&G�� advantage is the fact that the company is already ahead of its peers in the emerging markets. As of 2012, P&G had sales of $33 billion in developing markets as compared to $24 billion for Unilever (UL) and $10 billion for Colgate (CL). This competitive edge over peers will sustain as P&G has product quality, innovation and has a significant marketing budget given its comfortable cash position.
- [By Dan Burrows]
Rival Colgate-Palmolive (CL) has different concerns, namely sluggishness in emerging markets where it enjoys commanding market share and derives more than half its revenue.
- [By Dan Caplinger]
Lately, Johnson & Johnson has presented two different faces to investors. On one hand, the company has faced the challenge of dealing with a weak consumer-products business, as multiple recalls and close regulatory oversight of its production facilities have exacerbated J&J's problems. With its more focused consumer-goods business, Colgate-Palmolive (NYSE: CL ) has worked harder at taking advantage of international growth opportunities than many of its rivals, and Colgate's strong overseas sales, in comparison to J&J's international weakness, show the effectiveness of that strategy. In particular, Asia has been a focus point for Colgate, with revenue from the region having risen 9% year over year compared with less than 3% growth overall. Moreover, Latin America represents Colgate's biggest region for sales, with more than half again the revenue its U.S. segment produces.
- [By Ong Kang Wei]
Another example of such a product is Colgate-Palmolive (CL)'s Colgate toothpaste. I do not think I have to elaborate much here. Toothpaste is needed in our everyday life, and we will definitely have to buy more toothpaste after we have finished using a packet of it, ensuring that Colgate gets more and more sales over the years.
Top 5 Blue Chip Stocks To Buy For 2014: Apple Inc.(AAPL)
Apple Inc., together with subsidiaries, designs, manufactures, and markets personal computers, mobile communication and media devices, and portable digital music players, as well as sells related software, services, peripherals, networking solutions, and third-party digital content and applications worldwide. The company sells its products worldwide through its online stores, retail stores, direct sales force, third-party wholesalers, resellers, and value-added resellers. In addition, it sells third-party Mac, iPhone, iPad, and iPod compatible products, including application software, printers, storage devices, speakers, headphones, and other accessories and peripherals through its online and retail stores; and digital content and applications through the iTunes Store. The company sells its products to consumer, small and mid-sized business, education, enterprise, government, and creative markets. As of September 25, 2010, it had 317 retail stores, including 233 stores in the United States and 84 stores internationally. The company, formerly known as Apple Computer, Inc., was founded in 1976 and is headquartered in Cupertino, California.
Advisors' Opinion:- [By Wallace Witkowski]
Heavyweights in the S&P 500 such as Apple Inc. (AAPL) , Microsoft Corp. (MSFT) �, Comcast Corp. (CMCSA) , Cisco Systems Inc. (CSCO) , AbbVie Inc. (ABBV) , Honeywell Corp. (HON) , Priceline.com Inc. (PCLN) , DuPont (DD) , Dow Chemical Co. (DOW) , Monsanto Co. (MON) , and Starbucks Corp. (SBUX) �all saw a 20% or more jump in the number of short-interest positions in the past two weeks alone, according to FactSet data.
- [By David Dittman]
Answer: Verizon, NextEra, Enterprise Products Partners LP (NYSE: EPD), Pembina Pipeline, Apple Inc (NSDQ: AAPL) and APA Group (ASX: APA, OTC: APAJF).
Top 5 Blue Chip Stocks To Buy For 2014: Visa Inc.(V)
Visa Inc., a payments technology company, engages in the operation of retail electronic payments network worldwide. It facilitates commerce through the transfer of value and information among financial institutions, merchants, consumers, businesses, and government entities. The company owns and operates VisaNet, a global processing platform that provides transaction processing services. It also offers a range of payments platforms, which enable credit, charge, deferred debit, debit, and prepaid payments, as well as cash access for consumers, businesses, and government entities. The company provides its payment platforms under the Visa, Visa Electron, PLUS, and Interlink brand names. In addition, it offers value-added services, including risk management, issuer processing, loyalty, dispute management, value-added information, and CyberSource-branded services. The company is headquartered in San Francisco, California.
Advisors' Opinion:- [By Philip Springer]
Just last week, the major US stock averages hit all-time highs, led by large-cap stocks, including some that had been lagging for many years. But it’s been a different story in March-April for stocks that had the biggest gains of 2013 and early this year.
This week brought more bad news for the stock market’s two most overvalued sectors, biotechnology and information technology. Worse, when the paddy wagon came, as usual it took the good stocks with the bad, to rephrase an old Wall St. aphorism in politically correct terms.
Yesterday, the technology-heavy Nasdaq Composite Index tumbled 3.1 percent, its �biggest one-day drop in nearly 2陆 years. This dragged the broader market sharply lower, as investors resumed selling biotechnology stocks in general and many technology stocks. As of April 10, the Nasdaq Composite was 7 percent off its 14-year high, which was reached last month. Yet the S&P 500 and Dow Jones Industrial Average remain not far from their all-time record peaks, down 3 percent and 2.5 percent respectively.
There are many reasons for the decline of both the junk and the good growth stocks. First, the broad market has been long overdue for a 10 percent correction, which still hasn’t occurred.
Second, the high fliers were much more overdue for a reality check. These particularly include extremely overvalued companies in social media, the “cloud,” 3d printing, biotechnology and more.
Third, the new-issues market, which naturally has consisted primarily of info tech and biotech issues, created too much new supply that inevitably dampened investor demand for the more established companies in those sectors.
The increased importance of trading exchange-traded funds, as both a way to invest and to hedge against market declines, inevitably adds to the downward pressure in this situation.� Reason: Shares of all of their components are sold, regardless of each stock’s relative me - [By Sean Williams]
The biggest concern for the two largest credit card processing companies -- MasterCard and Visa (NYSE: V ) �-- is whether or not consumer spending is growing or slowing. If global dollars transacted and volumes are falling, that would mean less processing revenue for these giants. However, I can't actually recall the last time we saw a steady decline in credit card usage since the deep recession of 2009.
- [By Ben Levisohn]
Which isn’t to say there weren’t some winners. United States Steel (X) gained 3.7% to $27.31 this week on the back of a Cowen upgrade, while Visa (V) rose 2.7% after Mastercard (MA) announced a buyback, dividend increase and stock split.
- [By Bloomberg]
Scott Eells/Bloomberg via Getty Images American Express (AXP) is seeking to broaden its customer base by offering its first no-fee credit product that grants holders access to all of the lender's rewards programs. The "EveryDay" card is AmEx's biggest debut in terms of the amount of money spent on development and marketing since AmEx launched its "Blue" brand in 2000, according to Ed Gilligan, president of AmEx. The card issuer, already the biggest by purchases, is seeking new kinds of customers including U.S. mothers by offering incentives such as extra points for shopping at supermarkets, Gilligan said. "This segment didn't think AmEx had a product that fit their needs," Gilligan said in an interview at the firm's New York headquarters. AmEx, whose business was built on charge cards that didn't allow consumers to carry a balance, is seeking ways to increase loans and net interest income, which Gilligan has said comprise a smaller part of revenue than for competitors. Loans are increasing at AmEx slightly faster than the rest of the industry and they're regarded as an important source of future revenue growth, he told analysts last month. Unlike with AmEx's charge cards, EveryDay customers will have a spending limit and won't be required to pay their balance in full each month, according to AmEx. They also won't get extra perks such as earning triple rewards for travel and dining or access to entertainment events that are available to some customers who pay an annual fee on other types of cards. Terms call for the new card to carry a zero-percent interest rate for the first 15 months and 12.99 percent to 21.99 percent afterward, according to the company. Customers will have access to the full rewards program, which includes perks like transferring travel points that aren't available on other AmEx products that don't have an annual fee such as Blue, the firm said. The new card comes with EMV anti-fraud technology -- named for founders EuroPay Interna
Top 5 Blue Chip Stocks To Buy For 2014: McDonald's Corporation(MCD)
McDonald?s Corporation, together with its subsidiaries, operates as a worldwide foodservice retailer. It franchises and operates McDonald?s restaurants that offer various food items, soft drinks, coffee, and other beverages. As of December 31, 2009, the company operated 32,478 restaurants in 117 countries, of which 26,216 were operated by franchisees; and 6,262 were operated by the company. McDonald?s Corporation was founded in 1948 and is based in Oak Brook, Illinois.
Advisors' Opinion:- [By Jim Woods]
There�� nothing more iconic in the fast-food world than a Big Mac, fries and a chocolate shake. This tasty, profitable combination is the of restaurant giant McDonald�� (MCD), a company that has made a mission out of providing fast food to more countries than any other restaurant chain in history.
- [By Alex Planes]
Restaurateur Ray Kroc opened his first McDonald's (NYSE: MCD ) franchise on April 15, 1955. The hamburger joint had been around since 1948, but it was only after milkshake machine vendor Kroc sought to emulate the McDonald brothers' successful fast-food formula that McDonald's took its current form. The first Kroc franchise wasn't at the level of today's McDonald's stores, with their standardized, rapid assembly-line preparation methods. Potatoes were still hand-peeled and sliced in the store then, and soft drinks were served from syrup barrels. Kroc quickly progressed beyond this level of charming simplicity, and by 1958 he owned exclusive franchise rights and 38 restaurants. True growth was about to begin.
- [By Matt Thalman]
McDonald's (NYSE: MCD ) lost 2.16% today after an analyst raised concerns about future headwinds the company will have to overcome and lower the earnings-per-share estimates. An analyst at UBS believes that weak sales in Europe combined with the impact of the currency exchange rates will lower McDonald's earnings in the coming months. Previously, UBS had a higher earnings-per-share estimate than most of the other firms that follow the company, but due to these issues, it has lowered EPS estimates down to the consensus level. The firm, though, still has a buy rating on the stock with a $110 price target. �
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