Hot Blue Chip Stocks To Own Right Now

Hot Blue Chip Stocks To Own Right Now: McDonald's Corporation(MCD)

McDonald?s Corporation, together with its subsidiaries, operates as a worldwide foodservice retailer. It franchises and operates McDonald?s restaurants that offer various food items, soft drinks, coffee, and other beverages. As of December 31, 2009, the company operated 32,478 restaurants in 117 countries, of which 26,216 were operated by franchisees; and 6,262 were operated by the company. McDonald?s Corporation was founded in 1948 and is based in Oak Brook, Illinois.

Advisors' Opinion:

• [By Ben Levisohn]

  McDonald’s (MCD) is a disappointment. Its most recent earnings and revenue numbers were below the Street consensus. Its same-store sales are sliding. And its shares have dropped 4.8% so far this year, underperforming the S&P 500 by nearly 12 points. In fact, all that investors have at this point is a pledge for change, and that’s likely to disappoint too.

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  Unless it doesn’t. That plus the fast-food giant’s heft dividend are enough justification to buy McDonald’s, says UBS analyst Keith Siegner and team. He explains:

  This has been a frustrating year and could remain so as competition cont. to effectively execute and innovate against what appears not enough from MCD in months ahead. We are becoming increasingly discouraged that the current plan will be sufficient to close the comp gap to sandwich/burger peers (widened to -630 bps in Sept), let alone NT. It’s also unclear whether McDonald’s will truly address ownership, capital and cost structure opportunities. However, we still see significant potential to unlock value through multiple avenues, both operational and strategic corporate actions. Further, we are encouraged that despite results which were even more disappointing than prior quarters, shares were only down slightly, highl! ighting the support from low expectations and valuation and w/ a ~3.7% div. yield. Combined, we view the risk/reward as favorable and remain Buy.

  Shares of McDonald’s have gained 0.4% to $92.36 at 2:43 p.m. today, while Wendy’s (WEN) has risen 0.6% to $8.06 and Burger King (BKW) has dropped 1.2% to $31.72.

• [By Jesse Solomon]

  The impressive results are instructive at a time when other restaurant chains, including McDonalds (MCD) and rival Pizza Hut owner Yum! Brands (YUM), can't get their act together.

• [By Anders Bylund]

  Let's take a look at three classic dividend growers: Procter & Gamble (NYSE: PG  ) , Altria Group (NYSE: MO  ) , and McDonald's (NYSE: MCD  ) . These classic cash machines have increased their payouts without fail for at least 37 consecutive years, creating heaps of investor wealth in the process.

• [By Ben Levisohn]

  McDonald’s (MCD) has a problem. Investors have known this for a while, and now it seems McDonald’s management does too.

  Associated Press

  McDonald’s reported a profit of $1.35 a share not including charges, missing forecasts for $1.37. Even worse–same-store sales in the U.S. and Europe slumped the most since 2003. Janney’s Mark Kalinowski and Ryan Kidd explain:

  September same-store sales in the U.S. fell by -4.1%, which was even worse than our sell-side low projection of -3.6% (and also below the Consensus Metrix figure of -2.8%).

  The -4.1% number was also the worst monthly McDonald's U.S. same-store sales performance since February 2003's -4.4%. Perhaps an even greater surprise was Europe's September same-store sales decline of -4.2%, which was worse than our -1.0% projection, and below the Consensus Metrix number of -0.9%. The poor European showing was the worst month for McDonald's same-store sales in that key region since March 2003's -5.4% decline. Although APMEA (Asia/Pacific! , Middle ! East, & Africa) September same-store sales of -7.5% were better than our -11.0% estimate and Consensus Metrix of -11.0%, it's obviously not a performance to crow about, either.

  The good news is that McDonald’s finally acknowledged that it has a problem. It plans to simplify its menu, among other steps. It might take bigger steps, however, before investors can start believing in McDonald’s again.

  Shares of McDonald’s have dipped 0.3% to $91.35 at 12:28 p.m.

source from Top Stocks For 2015:http://www.topstocksblog.com/hot-blue-chip-stocks-to-own-right-now-2.html