A humorous look at the companies that caught our eye, for better or worse, this week.
SodaStream
SODA (Nasdaq)
April 17, 2014 close: $39.99 (U.S.)
up $1.28 or 3.3% over week
Easy homemade cola:
1) Fill a glass with tap water;
2) Stir in 10 teaspoons of sugar;
3) Add a squirt of brown food colouring, and enjoy!
Or you could buy a soda machine from SodaStream. The shares fizzed up after an Israeli newspaper reported that the company is in talks to sell a stake to a large soft-drink producer such as PepsiCo or Dr Pepper Snapple Group. Shareholders will drink to that.
IBM
IBM (NYSE)
April 17, 2014 close: $190.01 (U.S.)
down $5.18 or 2.6% over week
Making money on stocks is easy: Just buy what Warren Buffett buys. Er, maybe not. Shares of IBM – one of Uncle Warren’s biggest holdings – plunged after the computing giant posted its eighth consecutive quarter of lower year-over-year revenue, dragged down by falling hardware sales. With demand slowing in emerging markets, Big Blue shareholders are feeling, well, blue.
Coca-Cola
KO (NYSE)
April 17, 2014 close: $40.72 (U.S.)
up $2.09 or 5.4% over week
I’d like to buy the world a Coke – because, apparently, nobody else is. Coca-Cola’s carbonated beverage sales fell globally for the first time in 15 years during the first quarter, but investors took the news in stride: Thanks to strong sales of non-carbonated drinks such as Minute Maid, Powerade and Dasani water, total volume rose 2 per cent and Coke’s earnings matched estimates.
S&P/TSX composite
TSX
April 17, 2014 close: 14,500.39
up 242.70 points or 1.7% over week
Reasons Canada is superior to the United States:
1) We kicked their butts in hockey, eh?;
2) Our beer is stronger than their beer;
3) Our stock market is beating their stock market.
Lifted by energy and financials, the S&P/TSX composite is up 6.5 per cent, year to date, compared with 0.9 per cent for the S&P 500 and a loss of 1 per cent for the Dow. Investors are cracking open a two-four.
Western Union
WU (NYSE)
April 17, 2014 close: $15.25 (U.S.)
down 54 cents or 3.4% over week
Western Union specializes in transferring money – straight out of investors’ pockets, in fact. The shares plunged after retail goliath Wal-Mart announced that it is launching its own money-transfer service “for up to 50 per cent less than similar offerings on the market.” With Western Union’s stock down 20 per cent from its October peak, shareholders could use some cash.