Nike Inc (NKE)

Just bought the stock. He likes that they are moving to online sales. Margins are better. He thinks it will go from 75 to 100 dollars. Dividend yield is 1.07%.

This is a past holding. It has good price momentum, is in the top 20% of US stocks on that measure. It offers a great return on equity (35%) and has a good balance sheet. However, it is expensive (32x price to earnings) and has been more volatile lately. He will not buy at this time but it is a dominant global brand that he likes.

(A Top Pick Jan 3/17. Up 24%.) This has been under pressure. It is a little toppy right now, and you would have to wait and see. It has been news driven. He would tread lightly on this.

(A Top Pick Dec 30/16. Up 25%.) Sold his holdings as he felt some of the products, especially on the clothing side, could be easily duplicated at lower prices.

A good time to get into retail? Retail has been a tough spot. A global brand and one that has certainly performed well. Nike has been a beneficiary of the trend in athletic leisure space. He would pay closer attention to Under Armor (UA-N) which has been the laggard. Nike is a good brand around for ages and has generated good returns for shareholders historically.

He stays away from this. Had owned it for a very long time, but exited it 2-3 years ago because of issues with their inventory and how they were pricing their assortment, as well as the channels they were positioned in. Those remain as concerns for him.

It's the North American segment where they’ve struggled. It goes back to consumer preferences. This was the one to go to, but shifted with Under Armour (UAA-N) coming in, and now Adidas (ADS-GR) is really taking a lot of market share. Her concern is more around the leisure trend that is so dominant in North America, and when does that style change and move on to something else. Internationally they are doing well, but domestically they are doing a number of things where they are trying to right the ship and get back to the growth they would like. She is not keen on the apparel space because of the strong trends in recent years.

They had a bit of a pop when they announced they would sell direct through AMZN-Q. She wants to see more growth in emerging markets before getting into it. Don’t buy right now.

(A Top Pick Nov 29/16. Up 10%.) Sold this a while ago. He was starting to get very uncomfortable with the retail environment. Their shoes continue to do very, very well.

A company he admires, but bad news keeps coming out. They were very reliant on retail channels which no longer have the footfall they used to. They are under-indexed to online, which is where more and more demand for soft goods is going. Their quarters for many years have shown inventory issues. Feels they have also shown some erosion in price recently. He is just waiting for an appropriate entry point.