PZZA

The Delicious Business Model of Domino’s Pizza

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Domino’s Pizza (DPZ) offers investors one of the best business models, and the company garners one of the ‘Highest Rated’ economic castles in our coverage universe. That means that for each dollar of capital it invests the company generates gobs and gobs more, so much that it is more than almost any other company that we follow. The franchiser really sets the standard with respect to what we define as a pure “Economic Castle.” Not only did the pizza giant raise its dividend nearly 23% February 25, but the company beat expectations on both the top and bottom-line in its reported fourth-quarter results. It’s hard to believe, but domestic same-store sales grew more than 10% in the quarter versus the … Read more

Mixed Bag at Department Stores

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Where will consumers keep spending their money? This is a question that investors will always be trying to answer, no matter where we are in the economic cycle (during good times and bad). It is not always easy to predict the spending patterns of any demographic with any sort of precision, but let’s see how things shook out with some of the best-known department stores in the US during the third quarter of 2015. During the latter part of last decade, department store equities had been strong performers; shares of companies such as Macy’s (M), Kohl’s (KSS), and Nordstrom (JWC), for example, more than tripled from their respective bottoms during the Great Recession, but all three have witnessed their share … Read more

The Continued Rise of Pizza and How to Play It

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Image Source: Blaze The pizza industry is flat-out sizzling! Or is it stuffed? Call it how you want, but pizza is hot! Literally, and well, figuratively. There are some pretty interesting statistics about pizza. Here are a few from the latest Pizza Industry Analysis at Franchise Help: Americans eat on average 100 acres of pizza daily or 350 slices per second. In addition, 93 percent of Americans eat at least one pizza per month, easily making pizza the number one dinner choice in the United States. With such mass appeal, it is no surprise that this $40 billion industry (measured by sales per year) makes up approximately 17 percent of all restaurants in the nation…there are approximately 65,000 pizzerias in … Read more

10 Bucks per Hour; What It Really Means

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Source: US Department of Labor, Walmart Walmart (WMT) is quite savvy. The big box retailer announced February 19 it would raise the minimum wage for all of its US workers to $9 per hour in April of this year and at least $10 per hour by next February. The move comes amid ongoing public scrutiny of its labor practices, elevated worker turnover, and general malaise among the ranks on social media platforms. At face value, the news headlines show Walmart caving to public pressure, and a win for big labor, but in reality, the retailing giant is merely doing what good businesses do – pleasing customers (which are its workers, too) and widening its economic moat. Hiking wages accomplishes both. … Read more

Yum! Brands’ Fourth-Quarter Earnings Preview

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Yum! Brands reports after the bell today. Watch Valuentum’s President Brian Nelson on CNBCAsia at 5:40CT. If 16%+ comparable-store sales growth during any given period can ever be described as such, Chipotle (CMG) dropped the ball during its calendar fourth quarter. The fast-casual burrito maker’s shares are facing pressure as a result of management’s overly conservative comp guidance of low-to-mid-single digit growth for 2015, as if we haven’t seen this before. Chipotle sets the bar low and then hurdles over it like an Olympic high-jumper. McDonald’s (MCD), on the other hand, is in a world of hurt, and with CEO Don Thompson’s retirement, the brand has been shaken to the core as it struggles to connect with millennials. Investors in … Read more

Dividend Increases for the Week Ending August 1

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Below we provide a list of firms that raised their dividends during the week ending August 1. The dividend reports of covered firms on this list will be updated shortly with the new information. To access the dividend reports please use the ‘Symbol’ search box in the website header. Firms Raising Their Dividends This Week Acme United (ACU): now $0.09 per share quarterly dividend, was $0.08. Alliance Resource Partners (ARLP): now $0.625 per share quarterly distribution, was $0.611. CBOE (CBOE): now $0.21 per share quarterly dividend, was $0.18. CorEnergy (CORR): now $0.13 per share quarterly dividend, was $0.129. Crane (CR): now $0.33 share quarterly dividend, was $0.30. Healthcare Trust of America (HTA): now $0.145 per share quarterly dividend, was $0.14375. Host … Read more

Holy Guacamole! McDonald’s Wishing It Had Kept Chipotle

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Very few investors probably remember that Chipotle (CMG) used to be owned in part by McDonald’s (MCD). McDonald’s had originally taken a stake in Chipotle in February 1998, when Chipotle had but 14 restaurants in Denver. The maker of the Big Mac would go on to own 90% of the subsidiary and eventually spin it off in an initial public offering in January 2006. McDonald’s would receive ~$1.5 billion from the sale, but with Chipotle’s market capitalization now at over $20 billion, it’s clear the burger-and-fries behemoth exited way too early. The most recently-reported results by both restaurants tell the diverging story quite well. McDonald’s reported relatively disappointing second-quarter results Tuesday. The performance can best be described as flat. Global … Read more

Valuentum Economic Castleâ„¢ Rating Update

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Read: Keeping the Horse Before the Cart: Valuentum’s Economic Castle™ Rating The Economic Castle Focuses on the Magnitude of Economic Value Creation The Valuentum Economic Castle™ rating is an enhancement of the competitive advantage framework (commonly known as economic moat analysis) that has become widespread and ubiquitous within the investing world. Whereas an economic moat framework evaluates a firm on the basis of the sustainability and durability of its competitive advantages, Valuentum’s Economic Castle™ rating evaluates a firm on the basis of the firm’s future economic profit spread (return on invested capital less its weighted average cost of capital). The companies with the strongest Valuentum Economic Castle™ ratings are poised to generate the most economic value for shareholders in the … Read more