Although the bulls were stampeding higher yesterday, carrying the Dow Jones Industrial Average past the 20,000 mark, they lost interest today. The Dow closed at 20,100.91 on Thursday, up a mere 0.16%.
It could have been worse, though — you could have owned Whirlpool Corporation (NYSE:WHR), Qualcomm, Inc. (NASDAQ:QCOM) or Mattel, Inc. (NASDAQ:MAT). These three names were well into the red following their prior quarter’s earnings reports.
Mattel, Inc. (MAT)
Toy maker Mattel may have just completed what’s usually its best quarter of the year, thanks to Santa Claus’ generosity, but the last quarter of 2016 wasn’t good enough.
The company, which is known for popular toys like Barbie, Hot Wheels and Monster High dolls, earned 52 cents per share of MAT on revenue of $1.83 billion in its fourth fiscal quarter of 2016. Problem: Analysts were collectively looking for a bottom line of 71 cents per share and a top line of $1.96 billion. Sales fell 8% for the quarter in question.
CEO Christopher Sinclair commented, “Even against this difficult backdrop, our core brands continued to show solid growth, and our performance in key emerging markets like China was equally strong. And, importantly, we offset a substantial revenue gap from the loss of the Disney Princess license.”
MAT ended the day down a whopping 17.6%. Rival toy maker Hasbro, Inc. (NASDAQ:HAS) saw its stock fall 6% on Thursday, as investors fear that company hit the same headwind Mattel did last quarter. Hasbro will report its quarterly earnings on Feb. 6.
Whirlpool Corporation (WHR)
MAT wasn’t the only name to be up-ended by a disappointing earnings report on Thursday. Appliance company Whirlpool saw its stock plunge 8.5% after it too reported sub-par numbers for its recently-completed Q4.
For the quarter ending in December, Whirlpool Corporation earned an operating profit of $4.33 per share, and drive sales of $5.66 billion. Investors were expecting earnings of $4.52 per share of WHR, and sales of $5.58 billion. Overall sales were up a modest 1.7%; the company said Brexit was largely to blame. CEO Jeff Fettig explained, “All in all (Brexit) has cost us, just last year, probably 80 cents a share in the second half, which put a lot of pressure on the rest of our business.”
The outlook isn’t encouraging either. For 2017, Whirlpool believes it will earn between $15.25 and $16.25 per share of WHR, versus analysts’ collective estimates of $15.96.
Qualcomm, Inc. (QCOM)
Last but not least, Qualcomm was also sent lower on Thursday following a lackluster fiscal Q1 report. For the quarter, the communications technology outfit met earnings estimates of $1.06 per share of QCOM, but revenue $6 billion, though up almost 4% year-over-year, missed expectations of $6.1 billion.
Some analysts took note of the less-than-thrilling figures, including those employed by BMO Capital Markets, CFRA Research, Cowen, Pacific Crest Securities, RBC Capital Markets, Stifel and Susquehanna Financial Group. All of them lowered their price targets on QCOM, unsure that Qualcomm would be able to excite investors with forward-looking results.
QCOM ended the session down 5%.
As of this writing, James Brumley did not hold a position in any of the aforementioned securities.
