24/7 Wall St.

Starbucks Corp. (NASDAQ: SBUX) is scheduled to release its fiscal fourth-quarter financial results after the markets close on Thursday. The consensus estimates are $0.60 in earnings per share (EPS) and $6.27 billion in revenue. In the same period of last year, the coffee purveyor said it had $0.55 in EPS and $5.7 billion in revenue.

Big changes at the top were announced in early October. Patrick Grismer has been chosen to be executive vice president and chief financial officer. Reporting to Kevin Johnson, Starbucks president and CEO, Grismer will succeed Scott Maw, who retires on November 30.

Maw will remain a senior consultant through March 2019 to ensure a smooth transition, with Grismer joining the company on November 12 and assuming the role of CFO on November 30.

Grismer is an accomplished finance executive, bringing to Starbucks significant leadership experience at global, consumer-facing growth companies, including more than 25 years combined at Hyatt Hotels, Yum! Brands (parent company to KFC, Pizza Hut and Taco Bell) and Disney.

Excluding Thursday’s move, Starbucks has outperformed the broad markets, with the stock up about 6% in the past 52 weeks. In just 2018, the stock is up less than 2%.

A few analysts weighed in on Starbucks ahead of the report:

• Telsey Advisory Group has an Outperform rating and a $62 price target.
• Wells Fargo has an Outperform rating with a $64 price target.
• Merrill Lynch has a Buy rating with a $64 price target.
• Wedbush has a Hold rating and a $53 price target.
• KeyCorp has a Buy rating.

Shares of Starbucks were last seen up less than 1% at $58.63, in a 52-week range of $47.37 to $61.94. The consensus analyst price target is $58.71.

24/7 Wall St.
Stifel Likes 5 Top Energy Stocks as Solid Q3 Earnings Start to Roll In