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Apple as the Bull of the Day and PayPal Holdings have been highlighted as Zacks Bull and Bear of the Day

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For Immediate Release

Chicago, IL – February 8, 2022 – Zacks Equity Research shares Apple Inc. (AAPL - Free Report) as the Bull of the Day and PayPal Holdings Inc. (PYPL - Free Report) asthe Bear of the Day. In addition, Zacks Equity Research provides analysis on The Coca-Cola Company (KO - Free Report) , Coty (COTY - Free Report) and Hormel Foods (HRL - Free Report) .

Here is a synopsis of all five stocks:

Bull of the Day:

Apple Inc. posted blowout first quarter fiscal 2022 financial results on January 27 that helped the market start to bounce back from the wave of selling that had plagued stocks throughout the first month of the year. The iPhone maker once again flexed its financial firepower, resilient supply chain, expanding services segment, and more.  

Quick Q1 Recap

Apple easily topped our Q1 estimates, with revenue up 11% to an all-time high of $123.9 billion. Meanwhile, its adjusted earnings climbed 25% to $2.10 a share vs. the Zacks consensus estimate of $1.89 per share. Sales of the company’s flagship smartphone climbed roughly 9% to account for around 58% of total quarterly revenue.

The iPhone posted strong quarterly results for its holiday period after its iPhone 13 lineup launched in September. Apple thrived in Greater China during the period, with revenue up 21%, as iPhones started to grab more market share from local rival Huawei. Apple’s overall iPhone growth highlighted its ability to successfully navigate global supply chain bottlenecks that included a chip shortage and the strength of its growing in-house semiconductor segment.

Four of its five segments grew during the first quarter, with iPad being the exception. Its Wearables, Home and Accessories unit, which includes AirPods and the Apple Watch, popped 14% and Services surged 23% to account for the second-most revenue behind iPhone—services were the 2nd-biggest revenue driver in FY21, having pulled in $68 billion vs. $38 billion for 3rd place. 

Apple didn’t provide revenue guidance due to near-term economic uncertainty, but expects to “achieve solid year-over-year revenue growth and set a March quarter revenue record despite significant supply constraints, which we estimate to be less than what we experienced during the December quarter.” And the nearby chart shows that analysts have upped their FY22 and FY23 EPS estimates recently.

Long-Term Bull Case

Countless Apple customers rarely consider buying anything other than an iPhone or other AAPL devices, opting to stay in the broader Apple universe for various reasons. This is the case even if there aren’t game-changing differences in the latest release and highlights Apple’s impressive marketing and brand-building prowess that’s elevated its tech despite lower-priced competition.

Wall Street also never discounts how addicted people are to their smartphones and devices, even if popular apps come and go and social media allegiances change. Crucially, chief executive Tim Cook has successfully transformed Apple far beyond a device company through various subscriptions offerings that help it continually make money from its loyal customer base.

Apple’s services feature everything from Netflix and Spotify competitors to fitness apps and a slew of other offerings outside of its lucrative app store. The company closed the first quarter with 785 million paid subscriptions, up 165 million during the last 12 months.

The company ended the period with over 1.8 billion active devices. And Apple is also rolling out a potentially impactful new service geared toward business customers dubbed Apple Business Essentials—set to debut in “Spring 2022.”

Apple ended the period with $203 billion in cash and marketable securities and a total of $80 billion in net cash (cash, minus debt). Its impressive free cash flow also helped it return $27 billion to shareholders in Q1. The company’s massive cash position is helping it successfully build out its in-house chip efforts.

Apple could conceivably enter almost any new growth segment. This goes far beyond rumors that it might acquire beaten-down Peloton or get into the electric vehicle market, because the next game-changing tech innovation or space might not even be possible at the moment. And Apple’s new privacy features are attractive to customers, while also negatively impacting Facebook, now Meta, and other mobile advertising-heavy companies

Other Fundamentals

Apple’s fiscal 2021 sales soared 33% to crush FY20’s 6%. Last year’s top-line expansion marked its best growth since 2012, topping FY15’s 28%. Looking ahead, Zacks estimates call for 8.3% stronger sales in 2022 and 7% higher revenue in FY23 to reach approximately $423 billion—vs. $366 billion in FY21.

At the bottom end, Apple’s adjusted EPS are set to climb another 10%, even as they come up against 71% earnings growth last year. The tech giant’s earnings power is on full display with it then projected to post 9% higher earnings in 2023. Apple almost always tops quarterly earnings estimates and its bottom-line outlook has popped since its January release to help it grab a Zacks Rank #1 (Strong Buy).

Apple shares are still down around 3% in 2022 after rebounding following its Q1 release. The stock closed regular trading Monday at $171.66 per share, which gives AAPL 11% more room to run before it hits its current Zacks consensus price target of $191.12 per share.

Apple stock also trades at a 25% discount to its two-year highs at 27.2X forward 12-month earnings and right in-line with its median during this stretch. And it also trades at only a slight premium compared to the broader Tech sector despite blowing away the group over the past five years—up 420% vs. 140%.

Bottom Line

Apple stock is hovering right at its 50-day moving average and it could clearly face more near-term volatility and selling. And higher interest rates do impact growth-focused tech firms, which could be a drag on the sector as a whole.

Nonetheless, buying Apple amid the uncertainty of 2022 hardly seems like an outsized risk, especially for long-term investors. Apple is a money-printing machine and the world’s most valuable company that Wall Street remains infatuated with. For instance, 18 of the 21 brokerage recommendations Zacks has are “Strong Buys,” with two more “Buys,” and none below a “Hold.”

Bear of the Day:

Digital payment pioneer PayPal Holdings Inc. suffered a massive one-day selloff following its fourth quarter fiscal 2021 financial release on February 1. PYPL stock tumbled roughly 25% on the back of slowing user expansion and other setbacks.

PayPal’s Story 

PayPal is a digital and mobile payment giant that officially spun off from eBay in 2015. The company has grown for years amid a broader shift to online payments and e-commerce expansion. PayPal also benefited from the booming peer-to-peer payment world, where its Venmo app challenges fintech rivals such as Block’s (formally Square) Cash App and traditional financial powers like JPMorgan.  

PayPal boasts that its platform is “empower more than 425 million consumers and merchants in more than 200 markets to join and thrive in the global economy.” The company’s Q4 revenue climbed 13% and its FY21 sales surged 18% to $25.4 billion, with its total payment volume up 33% to $1.25 trillion.

PayPal’s growth came on top of 21% revenue expansion in 2020, as it gained more users amid lockdowns. Unfortunately, PayPal is struggling to turn some of those people into recurring users. Wall Street also got spooked after PayPal abandoned its user growth target. “We no longer believe that the 750 million medium-term account aspiration we set last year is appropriate,” CFO John Rainey said on its earnings call.

The company is now focused more on trying to get regular PayPal customers to use its services more often. Plus, PayPal has been negatively impacted by economic uncertainty, from “supply chain challenges, as well as a pullback in spending by lower-income consumers” and beyond.

Bottom Line

PayPal is still expected to grow its revenue by 16% in 2022 and 20% in 2023, with its adjusted earnings projected to climb by 3% and 23%, respectively. That said, its FY22 consensus EPS estimate is down 8% from where it was, with FY23 11% lower. PYPL’s downward earnings revisions help it land a Zacks Rank #5 (Strong Sell) at the moment.

PYPL stock fell another 3.7% during regular hours Monday. The drop is part of a steady decline off PayPal’s summer 2021 highs that has it trading around where it was before the initial covid selloff.

PayPal still offers long-term potential and Wall Street will likely start to scoop up the stock sooner or later. Yet, some investors might want to stay away from PYPL until it begins to show some signs of life again.

Additional content:

Factors Likely to Influence Coca Cola's Q4 Earnings

The Coca-Cola Company is expected to register top-line growth when it reports fourth-quarter 2021 numbers on Feb 10, before the opening bell. The Zacks Consensus Estimate for the company’s fourth-quarter revenues is pegged at $8.9 billion, suggesting 3.3% growth from the prior-year quarter’s reported figure.

For fourth-quarter earnings, the consensus mark is pegged at 40 cents, suggesting a decline of 14.9% from the year-ago quarter’s reported figure. The consensus mark has been unchanged in the past 30 days.

In the last reported quarter, the leading soft-drink behemoth delivered an earnings surprise of 12.1%. Its bottom line beat the Zacks Consensus Estimate by 14%, on average, over the trailing four quarters.

CocaCola Company The price-eps-surprise | CocaCola Company The Quote

Key Points to Note

Coca-Cola’s results in the recent quarters have been benefiting from strategic transformation and ongoing recovery around the world. The company’s top line has been improving, owing to the increased consumer mobility and the reopening of economies in several parts, which have led to increased away-from-home channel sales. The persistence of growth in the away-from-home channel is expected to have boosted volumes in the to-be-reported quarter. The company’s revenues are expected to have gained from improved price/mix, higher concentrate sales and unit case volume growth in the fourth quarter.

The impacts of volume gains in the trademark Coca-Cola; sparkling flavors; the nutrition, juice, dairy and plant-based beverages; and hydration, sports, coffee and tea categories are expected to get reflected in the company’s fourth-quarter results. Price/mix is likely to have benefited from pricing actions in the marketplace coupled with favorable channel and package mix due to the lapping of last year’s pandemic-led disruptions.

Accelerating investments to expand its digital presence are also expected to have boosted the company’s fourth-quarter performance. Coca-Cola has been witnessing a splurge in e-commerce, with the growth rate of the channel doubling in many countries. The company has been consistently strengthening consumer connections and further piloting various digital-enabled initiatives through fulfillment methods to capture the online demand, which are likely to have boosted fourth-quarter sales.

Aggressive cost-saving measures across the organization are also expected to have helped partly cushion the operating margin in the fourth quarter. This is anticipated to have aided the bottom line.

However, the company has been witnessing pressures from higher supply-chain costs, including higher commodity input costs and transportation expenses. It has also been witnessing pressures related to commodity and material cost inflation. The pressures from input cost inflation and other costs are likely to have hurt the performance in the fourth quarter.

Coca-Cola has been investing in its markets and brands to support sales growth, with higher spending toward consumer-facing activities. This has led to higher marketing investments in the past few quarters. Higher marketing spending, and an increase in short-term incentive and stock-based compensation are also expected to have led to increased selling, general and administrative expenses in the fourth quarter.

On the last reported quarter’s earnings call, the company expected marketing spend for consumer-facing activity to increase similar to 2019 levels in the quarter’s ahead, implying significant growth in the fourth quarter.

Zacks Model

Our proven model does not predict an earnings beat for Coca-Cola this time around. The combination of a positive Earnings ESP and a Zacks Rank #1 (Strong Buy), 2 (Buy) or 3 (Hold) increases the chances of an earnings beat. But that’s not the case here. You can uncover the best stocks to buy or sell before they’re reported with our Earnings ESP Filter.

Coca-Cola has a Zacks Rank #3 and an Earnings ESP of -0.36%.

Stocks Likely to Beat on Earnings

Here are some companies that you may want to consider as our model shows that these have the right combination of elements to post an earnings beat this quarter:

Coty currently has an Earnings ESP of +37.14% and a Zacks Rank of 3. The company is likely to register an increase in the top line when it reports fourth-quarter 2021 numbers. The consensus mark for COTY’s quarterly earnings has been unchanged in the past 30 days at 12 cents per share. However, the consensus estimate suggests a 29.4% decline from the year-ago quarter’s reported number.

Coty’s top line is expected to rise year over year. The Zacks Consensus Estimate for quarterly revenues is pegged at $1.6 billion, which suggests a rise of 13.8% from the figure reported in the prior-year quarter.

You can see the complete list of today’s Zacks #1 Rank stocks here.

Hormel Foods currently has an Earnings ESP of +1.14% and a Zacks Rank of 3. The company is likely to register an increase in the top and bottom lines when it reports first-quarter fiscal 2022 results. The consensus mark for HRL's quarterly revenues is pegged at $2.87 billion, which suggests a rise of 16.6% from the figure reported in the prior-year quarter.

The Zacks Consensus Estimate has moved down 8.3% to 44 cents per share in the past 30 days. The consensus estimate indicates 7.3% growth from 41 cents reported in the year-ago quarter.

Stay on top of upcoming earnings announcements with the Zacks Earnings Calendar.

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