A humorous look at the companies that caught our eye, for better or worse, this week
SUN LIFE FINANCIAL - STAR
Sunny days, ohhhh, sunny, sunny, sunny days
Ain’t nothing better in the world, you know
Than owning Sun Life stock in your portfo-lio ...
That’s especially true when profit leaps 71 per cent thanks to growth in insurance and wealth management, sending the stock to its highest level since 2008.
SLF (TSX), $44.93, up $2.24 or 5.2% over week
CRUDE OIL - DOG
Think I’ll go out to Alberta … actually maybe not. With global crude supplies outstripping demand by about two million barrels a day, the spring rebound in oil prices has given way to a summer slump that’s threatening to trigger even deeper layoffs in the oil patch. “We want to emphasize that the risks remain substantially skewed to the downside,” Goldman Sachs warned. Oh, goody.
Crude fut., $43.87 (U.S.)/bbl, down $3.25 or 6.9% over week
MONDELEZ INTERNATIONAL - STAR
Oreo cookies, Cadbury chocolates, Ritz crackers, Sour Patch Kids candies – Mondelez offers countless ways to ruin your diet. It’s also doing a nice job of fattening up investors’ portfolios: Shares of the company – formerly the snacks division of Kraft – jumped after activist investor Bill Ackman’s Pershing Square disclosed a $5.5-billion (U.S.) stake, betting that Mondelez will be the next player to be gobbled up in the food industry.
MDLZ (Nasdaq), $46.11 (U.S.), up 98¢ or 2.2% over week
KEURIG GREEN MOUNTAIN - DOG
Keurig makes single-serve coffee brewers. But after the thrashing its stock suffered this week, investors might want to pour themselves something stronger . Hammered by a 26-per-cent drop in sales of home coffee machines and 1-per-cent drop in K-cups, Keurig’s third-quarter earnings plunged 27 per cent from a year earlier. As analysts slash their ratings on the stock, investors are waking up and smelling the losses.
GMCR (Nasdaq), $53.43 (U.S.), down $21.61 or 28.8% over week
TESLA MOTORS - DOG
Call a tow truck: Tesla’s shares just swerved into the ditch. Even as the electric-car maker posted a second-quarter loss that was smaller than expected, the company warned that it might fall up to 5,000 vehicles short of its target of 55,000 deliveries in 2015, citing delays with the middle seats in Tesla’s new SUV. Investors are on the side of the road with their thumbs sticking out.
TSLA (Nasdaq), $242.51 (U.S.), down $23.64 or 8.9% over week