Hormel Foods Gobble!
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North America United States Consumer Food 22 November 2006 Results Review Company Research Hormel Foods Reuters: HRL.N Bloomberg: HRL UN Exchange: NYS Ticker: HRL Hold Price at 21 Nov 2006 (USD) 36.69 Price target 39.00 52-week range 38.02 - 31.93 Gobble! Gobble! Key changes Price target 36.00 to 39.00 Ç 8.3% EPS (USD) 2.17 to 2.20 Ç 1.0% Eric Katzman, CFA Christina McGlone Revenue (USDm) 6,026.3 to 6,140.4 Ç 1.9% Research Analyst Research Analyst (+1) 212 250-4968 (+1) 203 863-2283 Price/price relative [email protected] [email protected] 150 40 30 Highlights 100 * Hormel reports opr. F4Q06 (end Oct) EPS of $0.66. 20 50 * Mgmt. pre-announced EPS but results still above $0.63 consensus. 10 * EPS excl. 1-time items incl. $0.02 charge for a plant closing. 0 0 * Sales increased 5% on relatively balanced segments, vol. up 5%. 11/04 5/05 11/05 5/06 Company Bulletin * Grocery core sales -1%, profit up 3% with Spam, chili weak. Rel. to S&P 500 (L.H. Scale) * Refrigerated vol. +5%, profits +1% on strong foodservice results. Hormel Foods (R.H. Scale) * Turkey vol. +1% with profits down 12% on tough comp, meat cost. Performance (%) 1m 3m 12m Absolute 2.8 -3.5 4.1 * Specialty surges on +15% vol, profit +81% on broad ingred. demand. S&P 500 2.5 8.1 11.8 * Other segment sales +18%, profit +35% on international strength. Stock data * Mgmt. notes 2 small (US, Intl JV) acquisitions after the F4Q ends. Market Cap (USDm) 5,068.6 * Feed cost vs. pricing likely key to earnings and stock performance. Shares outstanding (m) 138.1 Free float (%) 100 * Hormel once again indicates F2007E EPS range of $2.15-2.25. Volume 284,800 * Our F2007E, F2008E EPS are now $2.20, $2.44, respectively. S&P 500 1,402.81 * Retain HOLD investment opinion, raising price target from $36 to $39. Key indicators * Our price target is based on a DCF model that uses a 9% WACC ROE (%) 16.3 (determined via CAPM: 0.8x beta, 4.5% risk free rate, 10% expected ROA (%) 10.5 Net debt/equity (x) 9.2 return). Our model is based on long term growth expectations including Book value/share (USD) 13.91 Price/book (x) 2.6 sales (3-4%), operating profit (5-6%), EPS / cash flow (7-8%). Net interest cover (x) 39.1 * Risks: competition (branded, pvtlbl), input costs (energy, raw matl, packaging). EBIT margin (%) 7.9 Forecasts and ratios Year End Oct 31 2006A 2007E 2008E 1Q EPS1 0.53 0.53 – 2Q EPS 0.48 – – 3Q EPS 0.42 – – 4Q EPS 0.66 – – FY EPS (USD) 2.09 2.20 2.44 OLD FY EPS (USD) 1.99 2.17 – % Change 4.9% 1.0% – P/E (x) 16.6 16.7 15.1 DPS (USD) 0.54 0.60 0.66 Dividend yield (%) 1.6 1.6 1.8 Revenue (USDm) 5,745.5 6,140.4 6,417.1 Source: Deutsche Bank estimates, company data 1 Includes the impact of FAS123R requiring the expensing of stock options. Deutsche Bank Securities Inc. All prices are those current at the end of the previous trading session unless otherwise indicated. Prices are sourced from local exchanges via Reuters, Bloomberg and other vendors. Data is sourced from Deutsche Bank and subject companies. Deutsche Bank does and seeks to do business with companies covered in its research reports. Thus, investors should be aware that the firm may have a conflict of interest that could affect the objectivity of this report. Investors should consider this report as only a single factor in making their investment decision. Independent, third-party research (IR) on certain companies covered by DBSI's research is available to customers of DBSI in the United States at no cost. Customers can access this IR at http://gm.db.com, or call 1-877-208-6300 to request that a copy of the IR be sent to them. DISCLOSURES AND ANALYST CERTIFICATIONS ARE LOCATED IN APPENDIX 1 22 November 2006 Food Hormel Foods Gobble, Gobble! Despite higher volatility across numerous input costs, the Hormel earnings machine keeps plugging along. This is a testament to the early vision of past CEO Johnson and soon to be retired CFO McCoy along with other members of senior management to focus on branded, value-added protein products, building and growing a dedicated foodservice sales force, driving EVA through the organization while emphasizing prudent-risk taking and seeing the growth potential from Specialty Foods. Excluding 1-time items, the strategy combined with focused acquisitions has resulted in F2003-F2006 EPS CAGR of 17%! This is top tier performance even compared to pure, relatively high margin packaged food companies. Concerns regarding relative valuation vs. those same pure packaged food companies and the supposed discount required due to Hormel’s more commodity orientation have been more than offset by the strong, consistent earnings performance (not so coincidentally matching the strong growth in EVA over the years). It is difficult to assume in financial analysis / modeling that Hormel, indeed any food company, can maintain such a torrid EPS growth rate. While new CEO Ettinger and soon to be CFO Feragen are long time Hormel employees, they are in the unfortunate position of high expectations and difficult comparisons. Indeed it would appear that the last half decade or so has benefited from a very benign input cost environment and Hormel will now, like many others, be more challenged on this front. CEO Ettinger believes the mix of businesses, reinvestment potential behind the Hormel and other brands and possible accretive acquisitions should allow Hormel to continue to grow at a solid pace. We agree although some concern is warranted. Management expects corn to settle in the low $3.40/bushel range, but the nearby future is trading at $3.60 per bushel with the March 2007 future trading at $3.76 per bushel. Regardless of whether this key feed ingredient declines, Hormel will need to raise prices across several key segments including Grocery, Refrigerated and Turkey. The company has been highly successful in moving consumers up the value-added scale but it is unclear how possibly 5%+ pricing moves will impact the consumer and their desire to trade down. We believe putting more emphasis behind the Hormel brand is a logical move. Management noted the Hormel brand is in excess of $1 billion in revenue (vs. total company annual sales of $5.7 billion). More consumer-oriented advertising will be put behind the Hormel brand in the future. But we wonder whether the entrepreneurial-EVA driven culture that has led to numerous successful acquisitions (over $1+ billion in the last 5 years) and myriad brands could be limited by retailers’ desire for fewer and more focused brands over time. Perhaps this is why CEO Ettinger is focusing more on the Hormel brand. This could cause a slowdown in growth in the U.S., although we recognize the somewhat unrelated Specialty segment is growing rapidly and management is making prudent investments to keep International growth a priority. We admit to missing the stock’s strong performance recently. It is clear the time to build positions and get more positive on Hormel shares are during times of market dislocation and temporary hits to fundamentals. Should the stock weaken on concerns over feed cost, we would likely become more aggressive with our investment opinion. With a solid balance sheet and good free cash flow, it is hard to make a case as to why the stock would disappoint too much even if feed cost hurt results for a few quarters. But for now, we are content to maintain our Hold opinion. However, we are raising our F2007 (end Oct) EPS from $2.17 to $2.20. We have assumed some pricing across Grocery and Refrigerated Foods, as well as a higher margin for Specialty. As a partial offset, we reduced our margin assumption for Jennie-O Turkey Store due to higher grain costs. As a result of the increase in earnings and the roll-over of our model to the next fiscal year, we are increasing our price target to $39 from $36. Our price target is based on a DCF model that uses a 9% WACC (determined via Page 2 Deutsche Bank Securities Inc. 22 November 2006 Food Hormel Foods CAPM: 0.8x beta, 4.5% risk free rate, 10% expected return). Our model is based on long term growth expectations including sales (3-4%), operating profit (5-6%), EPS / cash flow (7- 8%). Risks include competition (branded, pvtlbl), input costs (energy, raw matl, packaging). F4Q06 results summary Hormel reported operating F4Q06 (end Oct) EPS of $0.66 vs. $0.59, $0.03 ahead of consensus. This quarter’s EPS exclude a $0.02 per share charge for the write-down of the Houston, TX refrigerated foods plant. Sales grew 5.4%, on roughly 4.5% core volume growth and a 1% acquisition benefit. Specifically, sales of Grocery Products grew 4% driven by an approximate 5% acquisition benefit with volumes down 3%. Therefore, we estimate price/mix increased 2%. Management again noted strength in Hormel microwaveable trays, as well as bacon bits. Hormel indicated that it is repositioning Stagg chili to focus on the West Coast region vs. its prior initiative to roll the brand out nationally. This, combined with converting the packaging back to cans, cost the company about $1-2 million in the quarter (less than $0.01 per share).