Supervalu ($SVU) is a company that we have been following since its most recent earnings release on April 14. The stock has performed poorly in recent years. On April 14 the company announced earnings of $0.44 compared to consensus estimate of $0.34. The stock opened up 12%. Since then, the stock continued to rally for a few weeks before declining back to below the post-earnings level. It has rallied slightly from the lows of last week:
$SVU is scheduled to release earnings on July 26. Consensus estimate is $0.33 per share, significantly below last quarter actual $0.44. We think there is value in Supervalu ahead of this earnings release.
Yesterday competitor $WINN was up almost 20% on an analyst upgrade, citing stronger-than-expected consumer demand. The Cockroach Theory states that whenever you see a roach there are usually more hiding. In this case the news and stock price reaction in $WINN is the visible roach, and we think $SVU is hiding a roach (good news) as well.
The chart below shows $SVU in blue compared to $WINN in red and $KR in green. As you can see, $SVU has declined significantly compared to its peers since the weeks following its last earnings release. It has started to tick higher, but we think it has more room to run ahead of July 26 earnings:
$SVU has a new management team focused on cutting costs and branding. Consumers are still budget-conscious, to the benefit of low-cost grocery stores such as $SVU. That said, there are risks to our bullish view. Grocery retailing is a competitive business. $SVU still struggles to draw customer loyalty to its brand, and big chains like $WMT and $TGT continue to expand grocery product offerings. $SVU faces an uphill battle against these competitors and a headwind of high unemployment and fears about the economy.
Written by Jennifer Galperin. Follow me on Twitter and StockTwits.