Foot Locker To Gain From Strengthened Partnership With Nike: Analyst Forecasts Earnings Recovery Next Year

Each week, Benzinga’s Stock Whisper Index uses a combination of proprietary data and pattern recognition to showcase five stocks that are just under the surface and deserve attention.

Investors are constantly on the hunt for undervalued, under-followed and emerging stocks. With countless methods available to retail traders, the challenge often lies in sifting through the abundance of information to uncover new opportunities and understand why certain stocks should be of interest.

Read Also: EXCLUSIVE: Top 20 Most-Searched Tickers On Benzinga Pro In October 2024 — Where Do Tesla, Nvidia, Apple, DJT Stock Rank?

Here's a look at the Benzinga Stock Whisper Index for the week ending Nov. 22:

Delta Air Lines : Reader interest in Delta comes after the company hosted an investor day in New York. Among the items shared at the investor day were goals of mid-teen operating margins, 10% average annual EPS growth and $3 billion to $5 billion in annual free cash flow over the next three to five years.

Delta could also be seeing interest with the new White House administration being ushered in. Delta CEO Ed Bastian recently said President-elect Donald Trump could provide a "breath of fresh air" for the airline sector after years of "overreach." The Biden administration passed various regulations that protected airline consumers, including automatic refunds after canceled flights and a requirement for airlines to disclose all additional fees and taxes upfront.

Delta also announced it will start serving Shake Shack burgers to first-class passengers on some flights.

The carrier’s shares were down over the past week, but remain up over 50% year-to-date. The Benzinga Pro chart below shows the five-day performance.

Nike Inc : Bill Ackman's Pershing Square has increased its bet on the apparel company. After taking a 3 million share stake in the second quarter, a new filing revealed that Ackman added 13 million shares in the third quarter. His firm now owns around 1.3% of the company. Nike shares trade near 52-week lows after first-quarter financial results saw revenue miss analyst estimates and analysts weigh how quickly a new CEO can help turnaround the company.

"A comeback at this scale takes time, but we see early wins – from momentum in key sports to accelerating our pace of newness and innovation," Nike CFO Matthew Friend said after the Q1 results. "Our teams are energized as Elliott Hill returns to lead Nike's next stage of growth."

Investors could also be closely watching Nike stock to see how big of an impact Trump's promise to increase tariffs on other countries could hurt the company.

Nike shares were up slightly on the week and remain down over 27% year-to-date in 2024.

Autodesk Inc : The software company is seeing strong interest from Benzinga readers ahead of third-quarter financial results scheduled for Tuesday, Nov. 26. Analysts expect the company to report quarterly revenue of $1.56 billion, up from $1.41 billion in last year's third quarter. Analysts also expect quarterly earnings per share of $2.12, up from $2.07 in last year's third quarter.

Autodesk has beaten analyst estimates for revenue and earnings per share both in five straight quarters. Over the last 10 quarters, Autodesk has beaten analyst estimates for revenue eight times and earnings per share eight times. The company said that it was focusing on disciplined execution and seeing GAAP margins among the best in the sector.

Autodesk CEO Andrew Anagnost said these factors “will deliver sustainable shareholder value over many years.”

Some recent analyst ratings and price targets are listed below:

• Wells Fargo: Maintained Overweight rating, raised price target from $340 to $350
• Morgan Stanley: Maintained Overweight rating, raised price target from $320 to $375
• KeyBanc: Maintained Overweight rating, raised price target from $325 to $330
• Scotiabank: Initiated with Sector Outperform rating, $360 price target
• Baird: Maintained Outperform rating, raised price target from $305 to $330
• Stifel: Maintained Buy rating, raised price target from $320 to $340
• Barclays: Maintained Overweight rating, raised price target from $310 to $355

Autodesk shares were up 6% over the last five days and are up around 35% year-to-date in 2024.

Coinbase Global : The cryptocurrency company is seeing strong interest as Bitcoin continues to smash through new all-time highs and near the $100,000 level.

The rising valuation of other cryptocurrencies could also help offset concerns from Coinbase's recently reported third quarter, which saw revenue and earnings per share miss Street estimates. Trading volume and transaction revenue were down 18% and 27% quarter-over-quarter respectively in the third quarter.

The pro-crypto stance of the incoming Trump administration also boosted interest in cryptocurrency-related companies like Coinbase.

Coinbase stock was up on the week, but trailed the 9.5% gains of Bitcoin. Coinbase stock is up 93.5% year-to-date in 2024, also trailing the year-to-date 122.5% gains for Bitcoin.

Blackstone Inc : The world's largest alternative asset manager announced plans to acquire a majority stake in Jersey Mike's, a fast-casual restaurant brand.

While Blackstone won't IPO Jersey Mike's anytime soon. Still, it could benefit from the likelihood that more big IPOs are expected in 2025.

Reuters reports that medical supply firm Medline, which is partially owned by Blackstone, seeks a $5-billion IPO.

Stay tuned for next week’s report, and follow Benzinga Pro for all the latest headlines and top market-moving stories here.

Read the latest Stock Whisper Index reports here:

• November 1
• November 8
• November 15

Read Next:

• Stock Of The Day: Delta Air Lines Bullish Pattern Suggests Upside Ahead

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