Abercrombie & Fitch Co (NYSE: ANF)
shareholders were treated to a nice surprise 7 percent gain on Thursday’s open after the company reported fairly lackluster Q4
earnings before the open.
Abercrombie reported Q4 EPS of $0.71 on sales of $1.04 billion, short of consensus expectations of $0.75 and $1.05 billion,
respectively. In addition, the company reported a Q4 same-store sales decline of 5 percent for the critical holiday shopping
season.
Yet despite the luke-warm
quarter, Abercrombie shares are on fire on Thursday morning, a move that Standpoint Research analyst Ronnie Moas attributes to
a short squeeze.
Related Link: What
A Flood Of Store Closings From Macy's And Others Means For Mall REITs
“Looks like shorts – 18 mln shares short—are getting squeezed this morning,” Moas wrote in a note to clients. “ANF up 6% in
pre-market trading is trading at 0.2X sales, but they are currently struggling to break even in a difficult industry.”
Moas notes that foreign exchange rates have weighed on Abercrombie’s performance in recent
quarters and expects the situation to improve somewhat in the second half of the year.
According to shortsqueeze.com, Abercrombie’s
short percent of float is currently an elevated 26.2 percent with 5.8 days to cover. Short interest has
climbed 19.6 percent in the past six months as the stock has plummeted 26 percent.
The stock traded recently at $13.13, up more than 12 percent on the day.
Latest Ratings for ANF
Date |
Firm |
Action |
From |
To |
Jan 2017 |
FBR Capital |
Upgrades |
Underperform |
Market Perform |
Jan 2017 |
Jefferies |
Downgrades |
Buy |
Hold |
Jan 2017 |
Oppenheimer |
Downgrades |
Market Perform |
Underweight |
View More Analyst Ratings for
ANF
View the Latest Analyst Ratings
© 2017 Benzinga.com. Benzinga does not provide investment advice. All rights reserved.