Consumer Staples Select Sector SPDR® ETF

Valuations are at the higher end of their historical range. Investors should avoid defensive sectors, which are highly sensitive to interest rate changes.

Whole Foods Market reported a 1.9% year-over-year (or YoY) increase in its top line, primarily driven by new store openings.

Hormel Foods Corporation, based in Austin, Minnesota, is a multinational manufacturer and marketer of consumer-branded food and meat products.

Dr Pepper Snapple Group (DPS) declared a quarterly dividend of $0.53 per share on its common stock. This dividend will be paid on January 5, 2017, to shareholders of record on December 13, 2016.

In April 2015, PepsiCo (PEP) launched two new protein-packed snack mixes under its Cracker Jack’D food brand.

As of January 28, about 59% (or 17) analysts out of 29 analysts, have a “buy” recommendation for PepsiCo and 12 analysts have a “hold” recommendation. None of the analysts have a sell recommendation.

The Board’s Consumer Confidence Index rose to 92.6 in December—compared to 91 in November. For November, the index was revised from an initially reported value of 88.7.

By the end of August, the S&P Consumer Staples had outperformed the S&P Consumer Discretionary and SPY with respective returns of 0.89%, -0.18%, and 0.50%.

In 2014, Monster Beverage’s net sales increased by 9.7% to $2.5 billion, with 21.7% of its net sales from outside the United States.

As part of its portfolio management strategy, Archer Daniels Midland (ADM) sold its Brazilian sugar cane ethanol operations.

The Procter & Gamble Company, or P&G, is the largest household and personal products company in the world. It was established in 1837 by William Procter and James Gamble.

As of March 28, Coca-Cola and PepsiCo were trading at 12-month forward PE multiples of 22.7x and 22.0x, respectively.

Hershey plans to position dark chocolate as a lifestyle choice in the US. It has thus begun promoting its dark chocolate brands for specific consumption.

Dimensional Fund Advisors’ top buys are Apple (AAPL), AT&T (T), Microsoft (MSFT), L3Harris Technologies (LHX), and Verizon Communications (VZ).

The US energy drink and shots market grew by 56% between 2009 and 2014, even though the category was entangled in litigation and had negative publicity.

Kraft Heinz has a wide network of processing facilities and distribution centers, which allow it to supply fresh and high-quality products to customers.

Kraft Heinz is focusing on core business practices, including ZBB (zero-based budgeting), revenue management, and MBO (management by objectives).

Hershey is the largest producer of chocolate in North America. It is a global leader in chocolate, sugar confectionery, and chocolate-related products.

Hershey has set a goal of sourcing 100% cocoa from certified cocoa farms. In fiscal 2014, it sourced 30% certified cocoa.

Manufacturers in the alcoholic beverage industry can’t sell directly to consumers due to a three-tier distribution system. This discourages them from having their own e-commerce channels.

Carbonated soft drink volumes dropped to 8.8 billion 192-ounce cases in 2014. This is the tenth straight year of decline.

Dr Pepper Snapple is creating more visibility for its products by associating with popular movies. It expects its marketing spend to be ~7.6% of net sales in 2015.

CVS generates close to 70% of its annual sales by offering a full range of pharmacy benefit management services.

JAB’s share in the global coffee market is estimated to reach approximately 20% with the addition of Keurig’s brands and products to its portfolio.

Heinz has been using an inventory management technique, SKU rationalization to focus on profitable growth, which helps improve sales and profitability.

On October 7, Anheuser-Busch InBev announced a formal cash bid of 42.2 pounds per share to SABMiller’s board. This was the third offer rejected by SABMiller.

Whiskey is the largest category of the US spirits market with a 33% share of gross revenues. Vodka, cordials, and rum hold 25%, 11%, and 10%, respectively.

According to the Beverage Marketing Corporation, alcoholic beverages such as beer, wine, and distilled spirits, account for 20% of the US beverage market.

In this part of the series, we’ll look at the important events for the week ahead, from May 22–26, 2017.

Costco’s suppliers include companies like PepsiCo (PEP), Procter & Gamble (PG), and the Kraft Heinz Company (KHC). No single supplier accounts for over 5% of revenue.

You could consider investing in restaurant stocks, given the solid fundamentals in the sector and the macroeconomic tailwinds favoring the industry.

Pershing Square Capital Management’s top sectors in 3Q17 were consumer discretionary (XLY), information technology (XLK), consumer staples (XLP), real estate (IYR), and materials (XLB).

The NLRB filed a complaint last January. It accused Walmart of violating labor laws. The NLRB claims that the retailer acted against workers who joined unions.

Hershey is the fastest-growing confectionery company in China, and Hershey expects China to become its second-largest market behind the US by 2017.

According to the Tea Association of the USA, the specialty tea segment wholesale value increased to an estimated $1.9 billion in 2014, up 9.8% from 2013.

Overall, in 2013, still beverages performed better than sparkling beverages across all the segments except for Europe. Sparkling beverage volumes have been declining over the past few years.

On May 12, 2017, Walmart (WMT) was trading at a 12-month forward PE multiple of 17.5x.

The performance of liquor business in 2014 reflects the premiumization trend, or a preference for better, premium, or expensive liquor brands.

With the emergence of Jacobs Douwe Egberts, Keurig and other coffee producers will focus more on expanding their product portfolios. They’ll also focus on an international presence to capture the growing global demand for coffee.

The U.S. Bureau of Economic Analysis issues PCE data, and the price index is a measure of the average increase in prices for all domestic personal consumption.

On September 28, the S&P 500 outperformed the S&P Consumer Discretionary and the S&P Consumer Staples, which saw returns of 0.53%, 0.30%, and 0.11%.

Colgate’s worldwide gross profit margin fell to 58.5% in 2014 from 58.6% in 2013.

PepsiCo (PEP) is one of two beverage-industry behemoths. We break down everything investors should know about the stock and the business.

This restaurant industry does well when the economy is expanding and poorly when the economy is contracting. In other words, it’s cyclical.

In practice, asset owners (both retail and institutional) want to avoid significant portfolio drawdowns even if the benchmark index declines.

Margins in the food and staples (XLP) retail segment are slender. It’s important for Walmart (WMT) to keep a tight grip on the cost structure.

Last week, the S&P 500 (SPY) fell 2.6% due to a drastic fall in the energy, retail, consumer staples, and financial sectors.

As of September 17, Altria Group (MO) stock was trading at $62.44, which represents a 7.9% rise since July 26.

The consumer staples sector is an important sector in the S&P 500 Index (SPY).

Target (TGT) stock was trading at a forward PE ratio of 14.8x on January 9, 2018, which seems compelling when compared to the peer group average of 24.5x.