Hansen Natural Corporation – Aggressive Growth – Zacks Rank Buy | Stock Market News & Stocks to Watch from StraightStocks

Hansen Natural Corporation – Aggressive Growth – Zacks Rank Buy

Source: http://www.zacks.com/commentary/10367/Hansen+Natural+Corporation++-+Aggressive+Growth+-+Zacks+Rank+Buy
Posted on Friday, March 20th, 2009 | In Stocks to Watch

Contributed by: James Giaquinto (http://www.zacks.com/) -

Hansen Natural Corporation’s (HANS) Monster Energy drink helped fuel a solid fourth-quarter performance, and gives the company good potential for future growth. Earnings estimates are moving higher and the company has now put together 3 straight quarters of on-par or better-than-expected EPS.

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Earnings Estimates Cooperating

Over the past 2 months, analysts have pushed their earnings expectations for this year to $2.15 per share from $2.08, or 3.4%. That includes a gain of 2.4% in the past 30 days, as 5 of 7 analysts raised estimates.

More of the same for next year as estimates moved higher by 5.6% over the past month to $2.45 from $2.32. However, another important point, as far as Aggressive Growth is concerned, is that analysts expect profit for next year to advance approximately 14% from this year, which suggests that HANS is poised to continue on a largely upward trajectory.

A Monster of Quarter

In February, HANS announced that fourth-quarter net sales improved 3.1% to $254.4 million from $246.6 million. Results were helped by a price increase for all Monster Energy drinks in 16-ounce cans and Java Monster line of dairy-based coffee drinks, effective Jan 1, 2008.

According to Chairman and CEO Rodney C. Sacks, Monster Energy drinks grew in excess of the category and achieved further gains in market share.

“We continue to believe that the moderating growth in the energy drink segment appears, in part, to be due to the existing macro-economic environment as well as the resulting decline in store traffic and discretionary spending,” said Sacks.

Excluding a number of items due to the transition of certain distribution arrangements to new distributors, earnings per share of 43 cents inched past the consensus by a penny, or almost 2.4%. HANS has now beat quarterly expectations in 3 out of the last 5 quarters, and matched once.

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