For Immediate Release
Chicago, IL – April 29, 2021 – Zacks.com announces the list of stocks featured in the Analyst Blog. Every day the Zacks Equity Research analysts discuss the latest news and events impacting stocks and the financial markets. Stocks recently featured in the blog include: Apple Inc (NASDAQ:AAPL). AAPL, Facebook (NASDAQ:FB), Inc. FB, Qualcomm Incorporated QCOM, Ford Motor Company (NYSE:F) F and eBay Inc (NASDAQ:EBAY). EBAY.
Here are highlights from Wednesday’s Analyst Blog:
Big Winner for Big Tech in the Quarter
Again on Wednesday, market indexes were unscathed by words from Fed Chair Jay Powell following the latest two-day policy meeting from the Federal Open Market Committee (FOMC). Though Powell seemed less confident than recently on retaining the employment levels seen prior to the Covid pandemic (technology may have already replaced some of them), the Fed kept the status quo for the most part. The Dow lost 0.48%, the S&P 500 -0.08% and the Nasdaq was -0.28%. The small-cap Russell 2000 gained 0.13%.
Big earnings results were the main story after hours yesterday, led by a fresh blowout quarter from Apple. The tech icon posted a huge beat of $1.40 per share, above the $1.00 expected, on $89.6 billion, which bettered the Zacks consensus by $12 billion, 54% year over year. The company also posted extraordinary gross margins of 42.5% in the quarter, up from the 39.8% expected.
iPhone sales hit 47.94 million units sold in the quarter, up 66%. Its Services sector brought in $16.9 billion. Elsewhere, 9.1 million Macs and 7.8 iPads both beat expectations, as well. Even Wearables brought in $7.9 billion. To add to the strong fortunes of the quarter, the company added to its share buyback program by another $90 billion. If you weren’t sure why or whether Apple was the most successful publicly traded stock in modern history, now you know.
Facebook shares popped 5% on its Q1 earnings Wednesday afternoon, beating on earnings by nearly a full dollar to $3.30 per share (almost triple the $1.31 per share posted in the year-ago quarter) on $26.17 billion in sales, which easily surpassed the $23.84 billion in the Zacks consensus. Shares for the social media staple have just gone to a new all-time high on the news, to $309.50 per share.
Guidance for next quarter was positive, which also had something to do with the good marks in the quarter. But both Daily Active Users (DAU) and Monthly Active Users (MAU) were flat with expectations; U.S. DAU were indeed flat overall. Yet, clearly the monetization for Facebook’s sets of eyeballs are winning the day — in fact, the quarter. This is also the fourth straight earnings beat for the company.
Qualcomm reported fiscal Q2 results, which also came in notably better than expected: $1.90 per share on $7.93 billion in revenues easily topped the $1.67 expected (doubling the 88 cents from the year-ago quarter) and $7.63 billion expected on the top line. Revenue guidance for next quarter is now a range between $7.1-7.9 billion, with the current Zacks consensus at the low end. Shares grew 6% on the news.
Ford Motor put up a gigantic beat on its bottom line: 89 cents per share from 16 cents expected (another orbit from the -23 cents reported in the year-ago quarter) on $33.55 billion in sales, which also left estimates of $31.13 billion in the dust. However, shares are down 2% on the news as the well-documented chip shortage will cost Ford approximately 1.1 million vehicle deliveries next quarter, for a $3.5 billion negative effect.
eBay eked out beats on both top and bottom lines — $1.09 per share for a 2-cent beat on $3.02 billion which outpaced the $2.97 billion expected — in its Q1 release after Wednesday’s close. On the revenue side, this represents a 42% gain, which is the highest since 2005.
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