The U.S. stock market traded in green territory on Friday. Three stocks that registered upside movement are Lululemon Athletica Inc. (LULU, Financial), Skechers U.S.A. Inc. (SKX, Financial) and CAI International Inc. (CAI, Financial).
Analysts at Citi are more bullish on Lululemon as they upgraded the apparel company to "buy” from “neutral” and raised the price target to $73 per share from $62 per share, which represents a 21.5% upside from yesterday's close. The stock rose a little over 5% on Friday.
Shares of Skechers traded 40% higher after the company reported its results for the third quarter. It posted diluted earnings per share of 59 cents for the quarter and EPS of $1.57 for the nine-month period, beating expectations. Revenue of $1.1 billion also beat expectations and registered an increase of 16.7% year over year. The company attributed its record sales performance to a 25.7% increase in its international wholesale business and a 1.4% increase in its domestic wholesale business. It also recorded an 18.6% increase in its company-owned global retail business with total comp store sales growth of 4.4%.
For the quarter, the gross margin reached 47.5% of net sales, or $520 million, compared to $430 million, or 45.6% of net sales, in the year-ago quarter.
David Weinberg, chief operating officer and chief financial officer, commented on Skechers' performance.Ă‚
“Our international business continues to have the highest growth potential—both with emerging international markets such as those in South America as well as India, and our established business across Asia," he said. "To further build our brand globally, we grew our Company-owned store base worldwide to 623 locations, including 187 international stores. Combined with the third-party Skechers stores, there were 2,428 Skechers stores around the world at quarter end.”
For the next quarter, the company expects net sales in the range of $860 million to $885 million and diluted EPS of nine cents to 14 cents.
Finally, shares of CAI International gained nearly 19% Friday on the back of the company reporting third-quarter results. It posted EPS of 90 cents, which beat expectations by 20 cents, on revenue of $90.2 million, which also beat estimates by $1.2 million. Further, revenue grew 14.9% year over year.
Disclosure: The author holds no positions in any stocks mentioned.
