{"id":695276,"date":"2010-03-18T12:30:00","date_gmt":"2010-03-18T16:30:00","guid":{"rendered":"e2249889-c78b-43e3-9643-b1d7d4aa587b:409541"},"modified":"2010-03-18T12:30:00","modified_gmt":"2010-03-18T16:30:00","slug":"run-in-nike-shares-continues","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/mereja.com\/index\/695276","title":{"rendered":"Run in Nike shares continues"},"content":{"rendered":"

Nike Inc. shares are on a nice run Thursday morning and no, it's not just because of Tiger Wood's return to golf at the Master's next month. <\/p>\n

Up more the 6% in brisk trading, Nike stock is getting a bounce from better-than-expected third quarter earnings announced Wednesday after market close. The results were driven by improved demand in Western Europe and China and in categories such as apparel. <\/p>\n

"While the company remained cautious on certain geographic markets, management sounded upbeat about their overall business," said Kate McShane, analyst, Citigroup Capital Markets. <\/p>\n

The enthusiasm, she added, is based on renewed growth in Nike apparel, momentum in North America and stronger futures growth in China & Emerging Markets. As well, average sales prices continue to rise and management' ability to manage its supply chain is improving. <\/p>\n

At the same time, innovation continues to drive new product launches & share gains. Many analysts think Nike's new lightweight Lunar Glide running shoes and Pro Combat
\nfootball gear are expected to give a boost to future earnings. Events such as the World Cup in South
\nAfrica and Mr. Woods' return to golf should also positively impact the company's bottom line. <\/p>\n

One of the corporate sponsors to stick by the scandal-plagued Mr. Woods over the past few months, Nike executives did not mention the golfer's name once during Wednesday earnings call. On Tuesday the company issued the simple statement:  "We look forward to Tiger's return to the Masters and seeing him back on the course."<\/p>\n

Ms. McShane raised her earnings estimates for Nike and increased her price target on the stock to US$80 from US$75. Her Buy rating is unchanged. <\/p>\n

With Nike already up 22% since early February, she said the next catalyst will likely be the company's upcoming investor day on May 5. <\/p>\n

"We would still be buyers ahead of the investor day on May 5th, which we think will focus on further growth opportunities for apparel, long term growth targets, and capital allocation.<\/p>\n

Several other analyst also raised estimates and price targets following Nike's earnings beat. Goldman Sachs revised its price target to US$80 from US$78 and Barclay's Capital hiked its target to US$85 from US$75. <\/p>\n

UBS analyst Michael Binetti, meanwhile, maintained his Neutral rating and US$76 target. While overall he remains positive on Nike's business, he is cautious about the recent share price appreciation.   <\/p>\n

David Pett<\/a><\/p>\n

<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Nike Inc. shares are on a nice run Thursday morning and no, it's not just because of Tiger Wood's return to golf at the Master's next month.  Up more the 6% in brisk trading, Nike stock is getting a bounce from better-than-expected third quarter earnings announced Wednesday after market close. The results were driven by […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2571,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"advanced_seo_description":"","jetpack_seo_html_title":"","jetpack_seo_noindex":false,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[4821],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-695276","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-news"],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","jetpack_shortlink":"https:\/\/wp.me\/p9NivD-2US8","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/mereja.com\/index\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/695276","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/mereja.com\/index\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/mereja.com\/index\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/mereja.com\/index\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2571"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/mereja.com\/index\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=695276"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/mereja.com\/index\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/695276\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/mereja.com\/index\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=695276"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/mereja.com\/index\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=695276"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/mereja.com\/index\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=695276"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}