Monday, May 10, 2021
 

The Zacks Research Daily presents the best research output of our analyst team. Today's Research Daily features new research reports on 16 major stocks, including Nike, Inc. (NKE), CVS Health Corp. (CVS), and American Tower Corp. (AMT). These research reports have been hand-picked from the roughly 70 reports published by our analyst team today.
 

You can see all of today’s research reports here >>>
 

Shares of Nike have underperformed the Zacks Shoes and Retail Apparel industry over the last three months (-3.9% vs -1.7%). The Zacks analyst believes that the company has been witnessing lower revenues at the wholesale business and NIKE-owned stores due to the pandemic-led disruptions. Apparently, revenues lagged the Zacks Consensus Estimate in third-quarter fiscal 2021. In fact, revenues declined across all the regions, except for Greater China.
 

Nonetheless, the top and bottom line improved year over year in the third quarter, while earnings beat estimates for the third time. Impressively, digital sales of the Nike brand improved double digits across North America, Greater China, and APLA along with triple-digit growth in EMEA.
 

(You can read the full research report on NIKE here >>>)
 

Shares of CVS Health have outperformed the Zacks Retail - Pharmacies and Drug Stores industry over the last three months (+15.7% vs +11.9%). CVS Health’s first-quarter earnings and revenues surpassed the respective Zacks Consensus Estimate. Revenues across all the three operating segments improved reporting better than the company’s expectations. In fact, the Zacks analyst believes that increased full-year guidance is indicative of this bullish trend to continue through the rest of 2021.
 

The company noted that consumer-centric digital strategy has become more relevant in the current environment as people are using technology more while staying indoors. In the first quarter, the company has achieved higher levels of engagement across digital assets. However, a weak cough, cold and flu season impacted growth within both Pharmacy Services and Retail/LTC. Also, the repeal of the HIF for 2021 hampered growth for Health Care Benefits.
 

(You can read the full research report on CVS Health here >>>)
 

American Tower shares have gained +8.6% over the last three months against the Zacks REIT and Equity Trust – Other industry’s gain of +8.8%. The Zacks analyst believes that the company’s decent first-quarter results were supported by organic tenant billing growth. Going forward, American Tower’s extensive and geographically diversified communication real estate portfolio is well-poised to benefit from increasing capital spending by wireless carriers in 5G deployments and future deployment of additional spectrum.
 

However, its shares have underperformed the industry over the past three months. Also, the company expects a churn rate in its U.S. & Canada property segment to be elevated for several years, affecting overall organic tenant billing growth.
 

(You can read the full research report on American Tower here >>>)
 

Other noteworthy reports we are featuring today include The Southern Company (SO), American International Group, Inc. (AIG) and Parker-Hannifin Corp. (PH).
 

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Mark Vickery
Senior Editor

Note: Sheraz Mian heads the Zacks Equity Research department and is a well-regarded expert of aggregate earnings. He is frequently quoted in the print and electronic media and publishes the weekly Earnings Trends and Earnings Preview reports. If you want an email notification each time Sheraz publishes a new article, please click here>>>