Diamonds and Dogs

2/5/16

Get those frozen Buffalo wings out for the Super Bowl this Sunday! Tyson Foods Inc. (TSN) is today's diamond up 10% thanks to better than expected earnings. While quarterly revenue fell from $10.8 billion in 2015 to $9.2 billion in the first quarter, operating income was up 38% and net income surged 55%. The company also generated $1.1 billion in cash and used $300 million of that to repurchase its stock. The board of directors also expanded the repurchase authorization, increasing it by 50 million more shares. Tyson management also increased its guidance for earnings for the full year, and is now projecting earnings in a range between $3.85-$3.95 per share for the full year. In a market where it seems nothing is going right, it's nice to see at least one company raise guidance.

LinkedIn Corp (LNKD) is not linked in today. The company's stock down over $8 or 45% following disappointing guidance. The company did beat analysts' estimates for both revenue and earnings. However for 2016, the company warned that revenue and earnings for first quarter and full-year would fall short of analysts' estimates. Revenue was likely to be $820 million, not the $867 million Wall Street expected; adjusted earnings would be 55 cents per share, far short of the consensus of 74 cents a share.  LinkedIn is down over 60% in the last year down 45% or $9 billion today, losing the market cap of Twitter in one day. Not a good day to report disappointing earnings.